Effects of corona virus disease-19 control measures on air quality in North China.

ABSTRACT: Corona virus disease-19 (COVID-19) has substantially reduced human activities and the associated anthropogenic emissions. This study quantifies the effects of COVID-19 control measures on six major air pollutants over 68 cities in North China by a Difference in Relative-Difference method that allows estimation of the COVID-19 effects while taking account of the general annual air quality trends, temporal and meteorological variations, and the spring festival effects. Significant COVID-19 effects on all six major air pollutants are found, with NO₂ having the largest decline (-39.6%), followed by PM_2.5 (-30.9%), O₃ (-16.3%), PM₁₀ (-14.3%), CO (-13.9%), and the least in SO₂ (-10.0%), which shows the achievability of air quality improvement by a large reduction in anthropogenic emissions. The heterogeneity of effects among the six pollutants and different regions can be partly explained by coal consumption and industrial output data.

SUBMITTER: Zheng X 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7995075 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature