Health and economic benefit of China’s greenhouse gas mitigation by 2050
As the biggest greenhouse gases (GHGs) emitter, China’s climate mitigation has tremendous contributions to the global carbon and air pollutants reductions. This study is trying to extract the co-benefit on air quality, public health and economic costs in China and worldwide from China’s GHGs mitigat...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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IOP Publishing
2020-01-01
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| Series: | Environmental Research Letters |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aba97b |
| _version_ | 1797747813695619072 |
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| author | Yang Xie Yazhen Wu Mingjun Xie Baodi Li Hui Zhang Teng Ma Yuqiang Zhang |
| author_facet | Yang Xie Yazhen Wu Mingjun Xie Baodi Li Hui Zhang Teng Ma Yuqiang Zhang |
| author_sort | Yang Xie |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | As the biggest greenhouse gases (GHGs) emitter, China’s climate mitigation has tremendous contributions to the global carbon and air pollutants reductions. This study is trying to extract the co-benefit on air quality, public health and economic costs in China and worldwide from China’s GHGs mitigation policy. We construct two scenarios, with moderate climate mitigation action worldwide, versus more stringent climate mitigation action in China. We use the GAINS model to predict the GHGs and air pollutants emissions in the two scenarios, and a state-of-the-art global chemical transport model to simulate the annual PM _2.5 concentrations. We then use IMED|HEL, which is a health assessment model, to estimate the health impacts and economic cost of PM _2.5 pollution in each country. Results show China’s mitigation has significant impact on both air quality and health improvement in eastern China and eastern Asia, a little bit impact in the rest of Asia. The improved air quality could avoid 0.37 million premature deaths due to ambient PM _2.5 exposure by 2050s globally, with the majority happening in China. We use the willingness to pay method to estimate the economic benefits from the improved air quailty, and find that the reduced ambient PM _2.5 concentration could avoid $406 billion and $1206 billion economic costs by 2030s and 2050s globally, with China the largest fraction of 98.5% ($400 billion) and 99.5% ($1200 billion), respectively. The reduced ambient PM _2.5 exposure can also avoid 11.3 million cases morbidity globally by 2050s, due to asthma attacks and hospital admissions. Our study shows most of the economic benefits from air quality improvement due to China’s mitigation happens in China, followed by the eastern Asia (such as South Korea and Japan) and the rest of Asia. Health improvement is the main fraction of the potential benefits, such as saving health expenditure, increasing the work time. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-12T15:56:00Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-b411ae541e964fcf8d3e3cc72526b4ed |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1748-9326 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-12T15:56:00Z |
| publishDate | 2020-01-01 |
| publisher | IOP Publishing |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Environmental Research Letters |
| spelling | doaj.art-b411ae541e964fcf8d3e3cc72526b4ed2023-08-09T14:54:38ZengIOP PublishingEnvironmental Research Letters1748-93262020-01-01151010404210.1088/1748-9326/aba97bHealth and economic benefit of China’s greenhouse gas mitigation by 2050Yang Xie0Yazhen Wu1Mingjun Xie2Baodi Li3Hui Zhang4Teng Ma5Yuqiang Zhang6https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9161-7086School of Economics and Management, Beihang University , Beijing 100191, People’s Republic of China; Beijing Advanced Innovation Center for Big Data-based Precision Medicine, Beihang University , Beijing 100191, People’s Republic of China; Key Laboratory of Big Data-Based Precision Medicine, Beihang University, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology , Beijing, People’s Republic of ChinaCollege of Environmental Sciences and Engineering, Peking University , Beijing 100871, People’s Republic of ChinaGansu Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention , Lanzhou 730000, People’s Republic of ChinaGansu Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention , Lanzhou 730000, People’s Republic of ChinaGansu Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention , Lanzhou 730000, People’s Republic of ChinaCollege of Environmental Sciences and Engineering, Peking University , Beijing 100871, People’s Republic of ChinaNicholas School of the Environment, Duke University , Durham, NC 27710, U.S.A; Author to whom any correspondence should be addressedAs the biggest greenhouse gases (GHGs) emitter, China’s climate mitigation has tremendous contributions to the global carbon and air pollutants reductions. This study is trying to extract the co-benefit on air quality, public health and economic costs in China and worldwide from China’s GHGs mitigation policy. We construct two scenarios, with moderate climate mitigation action worldwide, versus more stringent climate mitigation action in China. We use the GAINS model to predict the GHGs and air pollutants emissions in the two scenarios, and a state-of-the-art global chemical transport model to simulate the annual PM _2.5 concentrations. We then use IMED|HEL, which is a health assessment model, to estimate the health impacts and economic cost of PM _2.5 pollution in each country. Results show China’s mitigation has significant impact on both air quality and health improvement in eastern China and eastern Asia, a little bit impact in the rest of Asia. The improved air quality could avoid 0.37 million premature deaths due to ambient PM _2.5 exposure by 2050s globally, with the majority happening in China. We use the willingness to pay method to estimate the economic benefits from the improved air quailty, and find that the reduced ambient PM _2.5 concentration could avoid $406 billion and $1206 billion economic costs by 2030s and 2050s globally, with China the largest fraction of 98.5% ($400 billion) and 99.5% ($1200 billion), respectively. The reduced ambient PM _2.5 exposure can also avoid 11.3 million cases morbidity globally by 2050s, due to asthma attacks and hospital admissions. Our study shows most of the economic benefits from air quality improvement due to China’s mitigation happens in China, followed by the eastern Asia (such as South Korea and Japan) and the rest of Asia. Health improvement is the main fraction of the potential benefits, such as saving health expenditure, increasing the work time.https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aba97bclimate mitigationair pollutionhealth impacteconomic impactIMED model |
| spellingShingle | Yang Xie Yazhen Wu Mingjun Xie Baodi Li Hui Zhang Teng Ma Yuqiang Zhang Health and economic benefit of China’s greenhouse gas mitigation by 2050 Environmental Research Letters climate mitigation air pollution health impact economic impact IMED model |
| title | Health and economic benefit of China’s greenhouse gas mitigation by 2050 |
| title_full | Health and economic benefit of China’s greenhouse gas mitigation by 2050 |
| title_fullStr | Health and economic benefit of China’s greenhouse gas mitigation by 2050 |
| title_full_unstemmed | Health and economic benefit of China’s greenhouse gas mitigation by 2050 |
| title_short | Health and economic benefit of China’s greenhouse gas mitigation by 2050 |
| title_sort | health and economic benefit of china s greenhouse gas mitigation by 2050 |
| topic | climate mitigation air pollution health impact economic impact IMED model |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aba97b |
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