Attribution of PM₂.₅ Health Impacts in Asia-Pacific

Abstract

Asia-Pacific anthropogenic emissions have changed rapidly in recent years due to industrialization, increasing mobility, and emissions controls. Although these changes have altered the region's burden of premature mortalities due to ambient fine particulate matter (PM₂.₅), the contribution of each sector and effectiveness of different policy measures has not yet been quantified. Such data would inform future decision-making on both policy effectiveness and the relative importance of controlling emissions from different sectors. This study estimates changes in regional anthropogenic emissions by industrial sector between 2010 and 2015, based on sector-level activity indicators and enacted emission controls. These factors are applied to an existing high-resolution emissions inventory for 2010 to estimate emissions up to 2015. Using a chemical transport model, the effects of changes in each sector's contribution to total PM₂.₅-driven premature mortalities are calculated for 2010 - 2015, in addition to the total contribution of each sector to premature mortality in 2015. 2,000,000 (95% CI: 1,740,000-2,260,000) annual global PM₂.₅-driven premature mortalities are attributed to Asia-Pacific anthropogenic sectoral emissions in 2015. The agricultural, industrial, and residential sectors constitute the top three sources of these total impacts. Between 2010 and 2015, sustained economic and activity growth, particularly in South and Southeast Asia, have led to 129,000 (95% CI: 106,000-166,000) additional annual premature mortalities, primarily across India, Indonesia, and Bangladesh. The energy and industrial sectors, in particular, cause 38,000 and 45,000 additional annual premature mortalities across these three countries respectively. Simultaneously, falling activity rates in other countries due to structural changes such as electrification of railroads, as well as newly introduced abatement measures over this period, including China's Action Plan on the Prevention and Control of Air Pollution as well as region-wide adoption of Euro IV/V/VI-compliant road vehicle emission and fuel quality standards have led to a total reduction of 95,000 (95% CI: 76,000-129,000) annual premature mortalities, primarily across East Asia, including China and Japan. These opposing drivers result in a net change of an additional 34,000 (95% CI: 23,000-47,000) PM2.5-driven annual premature mortalities between 2010 and 2015 due to Asia-Pacific anthropogenic emissions.