Published on 27 April 2020
Lockdowns imposed to halt the spread of the coronavirus have been recently linked with cleaner air quality over Europe and China. New images, from the Copernicus Sentinel-5P satellite, from the European Union Copernicus programme, now show some cities across India seeing levels drop by around 40–50% owing to its nationwide quarantine.
On 25 March 2020, the Indian government placed its population of more than 1.3 billion citizens under lockdown in an effort to reduce the spread of the COVID-19 disease. All non-essential shops, markets and places of worship were closed with only essential services including water, electricity and health services remaining active.
New satellite maps, produced using data from the Copernicus Sentinel-5P satellite, show averaged nitrogen dioxide concentrations over India from 1 January to 24 March 2020 and 25 March (the first day of the lockdown) to 20 April 2020 – compared to the same time-frame as last year.