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China's struggles with smog and air pollution have gotten a lot of
attention over the years.
But the air quality in India now appears to be even worse with
one new study (
http://www.epw.in/system/files/SA_L_8_210215_Michael_Greenstone_0.pdf)
finding that excess pollution is reducing the life expectancy of 660
million Indians by 3.2 years, on average.
The bars show the number of cities in each country with average annual PM2.5 concentrations in a given
range. Bars in red show cities that exceed national air-quality standards (NAAQS). The World Health
Organization considers an annual average of 10 micrograms per cubic meter to be safe. India's air-quality
standards set the limit at 40 micrograms per cubic meter. (Greenstone et al, 2015)
This photo taken on December 8, 2009 shows two people talking outside a coal powered power plant on the
outskirts of Linfen, in China's Shanxi province, regarded as one of the cities with the worst air pollution in the
world. (Peter Parks/AFP/Getty Images)
EVERY 100
MICROGRAMS OF
'TOTAL
SUSPENDED
PARTICULATES'
PER CUBIC METER
CUT LIFE
EXPECTANCY BY
THREE YEARS
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2013/07/03/1300018110) for
the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Greenstone
and his co-authors calculated that an extra 100 micrograms per
cubic meter of "total suspended particulates" in the air was
associated with a drop in life expectancy of about three years.
"I was surprised by the magnitude of the effect," Greenstone told
me (
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/07/08/chinascoal-pollution-is-much-deadlier-than-anyone-realized/) when that
study came out. It meant that coal pollution in northern China had
cut the lifespans of 500 million people by roughly 5.5 years, on
average.
Now, this latest paper (
http://epic.uchicago.edu/i/publication/Particulate_Matter_Pollution_in_India_Gree
which Greenstone co-authored with Janhavi Nilekani, Rohini
Pande, Nicholas Ryan, Anant Sudarshan, and Anish Sugathan
applies those same results to India.
The authors first calculate that about 660 million people, mostly in
north India, are living with annual levels of PM2.5 that exceed
national air quality standards (which are currently set at 40
micrograms per cubic meter weaker than those in China,
Europe, or the United States):
Estimates of PM2.5 concentrations across India
2001 district boundaries are used in this map. (Greenstone et al, 2015 (
http://epic.uchicago.edu/i/publication/Particulate_Matter_Pollution_in_India_Greenstone,_Pande,_et_al._PreProof.pdf)
Using the numbers from the China study, the authors could get a
rough sense of how much harm this is doing that's where they
estimate that excess air pollution in these regions is reducing life
expectancy by an average of 3.2 years.
Now, this is only an average: actual exposure can vary a lot from
region to region and person to person. Policemen who are working
in traffic all day get a higher exposure to air pollution. Wealthier
families who can afford air purifiers in their homes get less. But the
overall numbers are staggering.
The authors also find that air pollution levels in India's cities
haven't shown any improvement in the last five years. If anything,
things have gotten a bit worse.
Children cover their face to take precaution from the air pollution by a mixture of pollution and fog at NCR
region on November 7, 2012 in New Delhi, India. (Photo by Sanjeev Verma/Hindustan Times via Getty Images)
India and China, of course, didn't invent air pollution. Cities like
London and Los Angeles also once had horrific smog and
particulate problems. But as they got richer, they cleaned up
and there's every indication that developing countries will do the
same. The question is when.
China, for its part, has already begun to crack down on its air
pollution, through policies to limit coal burning in cities and curtail
vehicle use (
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/13/world/asia/china-releasesplan-to-reduce-air-pollution.html?_r=0).
So far, India has taken fewer steps in that direction. One reason for
that is that India is still much, much poorer than China. (Among
other things, India has 400 million people without electricity; China
has virtually none.) So the country is still focusing heavily on
economic growth which often means expanding the use of fossil
fuels. Energy analyst Mackay Miller summed this up on Twitter:
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That said, the problem has gotten so bad of late that India's
policymakers are beginning to take notice. In November 2014,
Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced he would make airquality data ( http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/10/17/india-airpollution-index-javadekar-idINKCN0I61L420141017) available to
the public and pledged to set new emissions standards (
http://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/india-to-announcenew-emission-standards-for-power-plants/article1-1289715.aspx)
for power plants.
Then, in February, according (
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/world/asia/delhi-wakes-upto-an-air-pollution-problem-it-cannot-ignore.html?_r=0) to
Gardiner Harris of The New York Times, Indian officials asked the
Obama administration for help in both measuring pollution and in
finding ways to reduce pollution from trucks. "One driver for the
change," Harris reported, "is a deluge of stories in Indian and
international news outlets over the last year about Delhis air
problems."
In their paper, Greenstone and his colleagues recommend a
number of additional steps, including better air quality monitoring
(India's cities have far fewer monitors than China's do), civil
penalties against polluters (India's pollution penalties are actually
so severe that they're rarely enforced), and possibly an emissions
trading system similar to the one that the United States set up (
http://www.rff.org/documents/RFF-DP-09-40.pdf) for acid-rain
pollution.
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