NO<sub>2</sub> Air Pollution Trends and Settlement Growth in Megacities
Megacities exert substantial demands on the world's energy resources, thereby producing large shares of atmospheric emissions and air pollution. Despite several studies on nitrogen dioxide (NO<sub>2</sub>) changes in megacities, a systematic analysis in relation to settlement...
Saved in:
| Main Authors: | , , , , , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
IEEE
2024-01-01
|
| Series: | IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10572220/ |
| Tags: |
Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| _version_ | 1850040924887842816 |
|---|---|
| author | Thilo Erbertseder Hannes Taubenbock Thomas Esch Lorenza Gilardi Heiko Paeth Stefan Dech |
| author_facet | Thilo Erbertseder Hannes Taubenbock Thomas Esch Lorenza Gilardi Heiko Paeth Stefan Dech |
| author_sort | Thilo Erbertseder |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Megacities exert substantial demands on the world's energy resources, thereby producing large shares of atmospheric emissions and air pollution. Despite several studies on nitrogen dioxide (NO<sub>2</sub>) changes in megacities, a systematic analysis in relation to settlement growth is still pending. This study examines the trends of tropospheric NO<sub>2</sub> pollution in 38 megacities regarding settlement growth by analyzing Earth Observation data. Multiannual records of tropospheric NO<sub>2</sub> from Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment (GOME), Scanning Imaging Absorption Spectrometer for Atmospheric Chartography, GOME-2A, and GOME-2B are evaluated regarding the World Settlement Footprint evolution from 1996 to 2015. Compared to previous studies, this work strictly uses remote sensing data and the spatial concept of functional urban areas. Therefore, uncertainties due to inconsistent spatial references, incomparable administrative units, as well as heterogeneously reported local data are widely excluded to enable an appropriate comparison of megacities across the globe. On average, we observe an increase in tropospheric NO<sub>2</sub> burden of 5.06 ± 0.83%/year and a relative settlement growth of 2.87%/year for the time period considered. We find a wide range of trends: relative NO<sub>2</sub> pollution ranges from an increase of 44.0 ± 5.9%/year to a decrease of −3.2 ± 0.2%/year, settlement growth rates vary from 0.3%/year to 9.5%/year. Despite this variety, the results exhibit a pronounced relation to the income group following the world's economies classification of the World Bank. Complemented by a cluster analysis and ranking of the megacities, the study provides indicators to develop a better understanding of the drivers and impacts of urbanization and air pollution. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-f74c43f0d0164f9ba2bbfce036fdd72a |
| institution | DOAJ |
| issn | 1939-1404 2151-1535 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2024-01-01 |
| publisher | IEEE |
| record_format | Article |
| series | IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing |
| spelling | doaj-art-f74c43f0d0164f9ba2bbfce036fdd72a2025-08-20T02:55:56ZengIEEEIEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing1939-14042151-15352024-01-0117120581207610.1109/JSTARS.2024.341957310572220NO<sub>2</sub> Air Pollution Trends and Settlement Growth in MegacitiesThilo Erbertseder0https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4888-1065Hannes Taubenbock1https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4360-9126Thomas Esch2https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5868-9045Lorenza Gilardi3https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4472-8530Heiko Paeth4https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8145-4706Stefan Dech5German Remote Sensing Data Center, German Aerospace Center (DLR), Wessling, GermanyGerman Remote Sensing Data Center, German Aerospace Center (DLR), Wessling, GermanyGerman Remote Sensing Data Center, German Aerospace Center (DLR), Wessling, GermanyGerman Remote Sensing Data Center, German Aerospace Center (DLR), Wessling, GermanyInstitute for Geography and Geology, University of Würzburg, Würzburg, GermanyGerman Remote Sensing Data Center, German Aerospace Center (DLR), Wessling, GermanyMegacities exert substantial demands on the world's energy resources, thereby producing large shares of atmospheric emissions and air pollution. Despite several studies on nitrogen dioxide (NO<sub>2</sub>) changes in megacities, a systematic analysis in relation to settlement growth is still pending. This study examines the trends of tropospheric NO<sub>2</sub> pollution in 38 megacities regarding settlement growth by analyzing Earth Observation data. Multiannual records of tropospheric NO<sub>2</sub> from Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment (GOME), Scanning Imaging Absorption Spectrometer for Atmospheric Chartography, GOME-2A, and GOME-2B are evaluated regarding the World Settlement Footprint evolution from 1996 to 2015. Compared to previous studies, this work strictly uses remote sensing data and the spatial concept of functional urban areas. Therefore, uncertainties due to inconsistent spatial references, incomparable administrative units, as well as heterogeneously reported local data are widely excluded to enable an appropriate comparison of megacities across the globe. On average, we observe an increase in tropospheric NO<sub>2</sub> burden of 5.06 ± 0.83%/year and a relative settlement growth of 2.87%/year for the time period considered. We find a wide range of trends: relative NO<sub>2</sub> pollution ranges from an increase of 44.0 ± 5.9%/year to a decrease of −3.2 ± 0.2%/year, settlement growth rates vary from 0.3%/year to 9.5%/year. Despite this variety, the results exhibit a pronounced relation to the income group following the world's economies classification of the World Bank. Complemented by a cluster analysis and ranking of the megacities, the study provides indicators to develop a better understanding of the drivers and impacts of urbanization and air pollution.https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10572220/Air pollutionincome classmegacitiesnitrogen dioxide (NO<sub xmlns:ali="http://www.niso.org/schemas/ali/1.0/" xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">2</sub>)time series analysisurban growth |
| spellingShingle | Thilo Erbertseder Hannes Taubenbock Thomas Esch Lorenza Gilardi Heiko Paeth Stefan Dech NO<sub>2</sub> Air Pollution Trends and Settlement Growth in Megacities IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing Air pollution income class megacities nitrogen dioxide (NO<sub xmlns:ali="http://www.niso.org/schemas/ali/1.0/" xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">2</sub>) time series analysis urban growth |
| title | NO<sub>2</sub> Air Pollution Trends and Settlement Growth in Megacities |
| title_full | NO<sub>2</sub> Air Pollution Trends and Settlement Growth in Megacities |
| title_fullStr | NO<sub>2</sub> Air Pollution Trends and Settlement Growth in Megacities |
| title_full_unstemmed | NO<sub>2</sub> Air Pollution Trends and Settlement Growth in Megacities |
| title_short | NO<sub>2</sub> Air Pollution Trends and Settlement Growth in Megacities |
| title_sort | no sub 2 sub air pollution trends and settlement growth in megacities |
| topic | Air pollution income class megacities nitrogen dioxide (NO<sub xmlns:ali="http://www.niso.org/schemas/ali/1.0/" xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">2</sub>) time series analysis urban growth |
| url | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10572220/ |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT thiloerbertseder nosub2subairpollutiontrendsandsettlementgrowthinmegacities AT hannestaubenbock nosub2subairpollutiontrendsandsettlementgrowthinmegacities AT thomasesch nosub2subairpollutiontrendsandsettlementgrowthinmegacities AT lorenzagilardi nosub2subairpollutiontrendsandsettlementgrowthinmegacities AT heikopaeth nosub2subairpollutiontrendsandsettlementgrowthinmegacities AT stefandech nosub2subairpollutiontrendsandsettlementgrowthinmegacities |