How street-level data is changing the way India sees air pollution—and the startup behind it

air quality-focused climate-tech startup, for a full retrofit. Today, every IntrCity SmartBus functions like a moving air-quality lab.

Calibrated sensors track PM2.5, the air quality index (AQI), carbon dioxide, temperature and humidity inside the cabin, while simultaneously sensing outdoor air quality through Respirer’s city-level sensor network. That data flows into Respirer’s analytics platform, which decides, automatically, when filtration needs to be ramped up and how air quality can be kept within safe limits.For passengers, the experience is simple.

Real-time air quality readings show up on in-bus screens and on the IntrCity app. For operations teams, dashboards break the data down by route and vehicle, flagging alerts and maintenance needs.

In early deployments, these buses managed to keep in-cabin PM2.5 levels around 30 micrograms per cubic metre for over 90% of the journey, on days when outdoor pollution in Delhi crossed 200.Respirer Living Sciences isn’t just about cleaner travel. The startup builds and operates hyperlocal air-quality monitoring systems that measure pollutants at street and neighbourhood level in real time.

It has quietly built one of the country’s largest independent, hyperlocal, air-quality monitoring networks. With more than 2,500 sensors across 40-plus cities, the company’s dense, street-level data reveals what government stations often miss: school zones that see pollution spike at 8am, industrial clusters that go unmonitored, neighbourhoods where pollution doubles within a few hundred metres.The data compiled by the company now feeds researchers, industries and climate-risk models, largely without fanfare.Founded by Ronak Sutaria, who earlier helped build India’s first independent