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Lumbini, in southern Nepal, is a UNESCO world heritage site ofuniversal value as the birthplace of Buddha. Poor air quality inLumbini and surrounding regions is a great concern for public healthas well as for preservation, protection and promotion of Buddhistheritage and culture. We present here results from measurements ofambient concentrations of key air pollutants (PM, BC, CO,O3) in Lumbini, first of its kind for Lumbini, conductedduring an intensive measurement period of 3 months(April–June 2013) in the pre-monsoon season. The measurements werecarried out as a part of the international air pollution measurementcampaign; SusKat-ABC (Sustainable Atmosphere for the KathmanduValley – Atmospheric Brown Clouds). The main objective of this workis to understand and document the level of air pollution, diurnalcharacteristics and influence of open burning on air quality inLumbini. The hourly average concentrations during the entiremeasurement campaign ranged as follows: BC was0.3–30.0 µg m−3, PM1 was3.6–197.6 µg m−3, PM2. 5 was6.1–272.2 µg m−3, PM10 was10.5–604.0 µg m−3, O3 was1.0–118.1 ppbv and CO was 125.0–1430.0 ppbv. Theselevels are comparable to other very heavily polluted sites in SouthAsia. Higher fraction of coarse-mode PM was found as compared toother nearby sites in the Indo-Gangetic Plain region. The ΔBC ∕ ΔCO ratio obtained in Lumbini indicatedconsiderable contributions of emissions from both residential andtransportation sectors. The 24 h average PM2. 5 andPM10 concentrations exceeded the WHO guideline veryfrequently (94 and 85 % of the sampled period, respectively),which implies significant health risks for the residents andvisitors in the region. These air pollutants exhibited clear diurnalcycles with high values in the morning and evening. During the studyperiod, the worst air pollution episodes were mainly due toagro-residue burning and regional forest fires combined withmeteorological conditions conducive of pollution transport toLumbini. Fossil fuel combustion also contributed significantly,accounting for more than half of the ambient BC concentrationaccording to aerosol spectral light absorption coefficients obtainedin Lumbini. WRF-STEM, a regional chemical transport model, was usedto simulate the meteorology and the concentrations of pollutants tounderstand the pollutant transport pathways. The model estimatedvalues were ∼ 1. 5 to 5 times lower than the observedconcentrations for CO and PM10, respectively. Model-simulated regionally tagged CO tracers showed that the majority ofCO came from the upwind region of Ganges Valley. Model performanceneeds significant improvement in simulating aerosols in theregion. Given the high air pollution level, there is a clear andurgent need for setting up a network of long-term air qualitymonitoring stations in the greater Lumbini region

Pre-monsoon air quality over Lumbini, a world heritage site along the Himalayan foothills