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Situation of urban mobility in Pakistan: Before, during, and after the COVID-19 lockdown with climatic risk perceptions
Institute of Natural Disaster Research, School of Environmental Science, Northeast Normal University, Changchun, 130024, China.
Institute of Natural Disaster Research, School of Environmental Science, Northeast Normal University, Changchun, 130024, China.
Agriculture Department, Spatial Business Integration GmbH (SBI), Marienburgstraße 27, Darmstadt, 64297, Germany.
Department of Geography, Yazd University, Yazd, 8915818411, Iran.
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2021 (English)In: Atmosphere, E-ISSN 2073-4433, Vol. 12, no 9, article id 1190Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Sustainable development
Sustainable Development
Abstract [en]

The coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) has impacted the usual global movement patterns, atmospheric pollutants, and climatic parameters. The current study sought to assess the impact of the COVID-19 lockdown on urban mobility, atmospheric pollutants, and Pakistan’s climate. For the air pollution assessment, total column ozone (O3), sulphur dioxide (SO2), and tropospheric column nitrogen dioxide (NO2) data from the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI), aerosol optical depth (AOD) data from the Multi-angle Imaging Spectroradiometer (MISR), and dust column mass density (PM2.5) data from the MERRA-2 satellite were used. Furthermore, these datasets are linked to climatic parameters (temperature, precipitation, wind speed). The Kruskal–Wallis H test (KWt) is used to compare medians among k groups (k > 2), and the Wilcoxon signed-rank sum test (WRST) is for analyzing the differences between the medians of two datasets. To make the analysis more effective, and to justify that the variations in air quality parameters are due to the COVID-19 pandemic, a Generalized Linear Model (GLM) was used. The findings revealed that the limitations on human mobility have lowered emissions, which has improved the air quality in Pakistan. The results of the study showed that the climatic parameters (precipitation, Tmax, Tmin, and Tmean) have a positive correlation and wind speed has a negative correlation with NO2 and AOD. This study found a significant decrease in air pollutants (NO2, SO2, O3, AOD) of 30–40% in Pakistan during the strict lockdown period. In this duration, the highest drop of about 28% in NO2 concentrations has been found in Karachi. Total column O3 did not show any reduction during the strict lockdown, but a minor decline was depicted as 0.38% in Lahore and 0.55% in Islamabad during the loosening lockdown. During strict lockdown, AOD was reduced up to 23% in Islamabad and 14.46% in Lahore. The results of KWt and WRST evident that all the mobility indices are significant (p < 0.05) in nature. The GLM justified that restraining human activities during the lockdown has decreased anthropogenic emissions and, as a result, improved air quality, particularly in metropolitan areas.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
MDPI , 2021. Vol. 12, no 9, article id 1190
Keywords [en]
Air pollution, AOD, Climate parameters, COVID-19, GLM, Lockdown, NO2, O3, PM2.5, SO2, Urban mobility, Air quality, Nitrogen oxides, Ozone, Sulfur dioxide, Ultraviolet spectrometers, Wind, Aerosol optical depths, Air pollution assessments, Air quality parameters, Anthropogenic emissions, Atmospheric pollutants, Generalized linear model, Multiangle imaging spectroradiometer, Ozone monitoring instruments, Risk perception, Coronavirus
National Category
Climate Research
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:hj:diva-54746DOI: 10.3390/atmos12091190ISI: 000699716900001Scopus ID: 2-s2.0-85115141585Local ID: GOA;intsam;767749OAI: oai:DiVA.org:hj-54746DiVA, id: diva2:1597622
Available from: 2021-09-27 Created: 2021-09-27 Last updated: 2024-07-04Bibliographically approved

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