The worldwide COVID-19 lockdown impacts on global secondary inorganic aerosols and radiative budget.

ABSTRACT: Global lockdown measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) led to air pollutant emission reductions. While the COVID-19 lockdown impacts on both trace gas and total particulate pollutants have been widely investigated, secondary aerosol formation from trace gases remains unclear. To that end, we quantify the COVID-19 lockdown impacts on NO_x and SO₂ emissions and sulfate-nitrate-ammonium aerosols using multiconstituent satellite data assimilation and model simulations. We find that anthropogenic emissions over major polluted regions were reduced by 19 to 25% for NO_x and 14 to 20% for SO₂ during April 2020. These emission reductions led to 8 to 21% decreases in sulfate and nitrate aerosols over highly polluted areas,

SUBMITTER: Sekiya T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10381952 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature