Lahore's October Smog Fell 27% Year-on-Year, but Weather Drove Most of the Gain: PAQI Report

Fine-particle pollution in Lahore fell 27 percent this October compared with the same month last year, according to an analysis by the Pakistan Air Quality Initiative (PAQI), but the study concludes that milder weather rather than policy or other interventions was responsible for most of the decline.

Across 26 monitoring sites that reported on the same days in both years, average PM2.5 levels dropped from 136.3 µg/m³ in October 2025 to 100.1 µg/m³ in October 2026, with 24 of the 26 locations recording a fall. PAQI built a computer model trained on every autumn since 2018 to separate the effect of weather conditions from all other factors. It estimates that this October's weather alone reduced PM2.5 by about 19 percent compared with what last October's weather would have produced.

If both months had experienced the same typical weather, the gap would narrow to just 4 percent — a figure that covers government measures, crop burning and every other source combined, which the data cannot distinguish between. The largest single factor was nighttime conditions: the layer of cool air that traps smoke near the ground averaged 68 metres deep this October, against 43 metres a year earlier, giving pollution more room to disperse.

Satellites also detected roughly a third fewer crop fires across Pakistani Punjab and in the Indian states of Punjab and Haryana. However, the main burning season began about a week later than in 2025, meaning part of the apparent drop may simply have shifted into November.

Despite the improvement, Lahore's air exceeded Pakistan's legal limit of 35 µg/m³ on all 31 days of October. The monthly average of about 100 µg/m³ is nearly seven times the World Health Organization's daily guideline of 15 µg/m³, although it still marked the city's cleanest October since 2021 and came in roughly 18 percent below the 2020–2025 average of 122 µg/m³. Multan (106 µg/m³) and Gujranwala (105) recorded higher October averages than Lahore, while Rawalpindi (50) was the cleanest among Punjab's six best-monitored cities.

The relief may prove short-lived. PAQI's Hawanama forecast projects Lahore's PM2.5 climbing to 149 µg/m³ — classed as "Very Unhealthy" — by Wednesday, November 4, about 49 percent above the October average. Last year the city's air was declared hazardous in early November, and the Punjab government has again deployed anti-smog guns across Lahore this season.