-Down to Earth Ammonia concentration in the atmosphere over India is the highest in the world due to cattle population and excessive fertilizer use, says study A satellite study of airborne ammonia gas has revealed four major hotspots over productive agricultural regions across the world. Increased atmospheric ammonia is linked to poor air and water quality. Using data from NASA’s Atmospheric Infrared Sounder satellite instrument, researchers led by the University of Maryland...

-PTI Crude oil and natural gas contract; the previous low of 0.9% was recorded in December 2015 New Delhi: The growth of eight core sectors slipped to over one-year low of 1% in February mainly due to decline in output of crude oil, natural gas, refinery products, fertilisers and cement. The growth rate of eight infrastructure sectors of coal, crude oil, natural gas, refinery products, fertilisers, steel, cement and electricity was 9.4% in...

-PTI New Delhi: The government has made having an Aadhaar card must for poor women to avail of free cooking gas (LPG) connection under the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana. While the government in October last year had made the unique identification number mandatory for everyone to get LPG subsidies, it has now extended the same for free cooking gas connections to women of BPL households. The government had last year launched the Pradhan...

-The Hindu People migrating due to environmental disasters should be accorded ‘refugee’ status in international law An increasing number of people globally are facing displacement due to droughts, famines, rising sea levels and other natural disasters caused by climate change. This class of migrants has been labelled as ‘environmental refugees’ in popular literature. According to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, an international body reviewing trends of internal displacement, an estimated 24 million...

Delhi's air is not fit to inhale. Experts argue that prolonged exposure to toxic air could lead to serious health hazards like heart and lung diseases, various types of cancer etc. But is it the case that the smog, which engulfed the entire National Capital Region (NCR) and many of the north Indian cities during October-November was entirely caused due to burning of firecrackers in Diwali or because of vehicular...