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Impact of COVID-19 force confinement for CO2 emission, NO2 concentration, and daily traffic congestion throughout EU nations and the United Kingdom (UK)

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Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic led to unprecedented global challenges, with governments enforcing strict confinement measures to curb its spread. Within the European Union (EU) and United Kingdom (UK), these measures had significant socio-economic repercussions and manifested in altered environmental parameters, notably CO2 emissions, NO2 concentrations, and traffic congestion. The objective of this study is to determine the coronavirus’s influence on CO2 emissions, NO2 concentrations, and traffic congestion, as well as the relationship between NO2 concentrations and CO2 emissions across the EU and UK from January 2019 until end of 2022. In agreement with earlier research, our results indicate a decrease in CO2 emissions over a more extended period of 2020 until 2022 than the annual emissions in 2019. This study shows significant reductions of 10.66%, 2.66%, and 0.18% in 2020, 2021, and 2022, respectively, compared to the same period in 2019. Furthermore, we discovered monthly NO2 concentrations decreased by 2–39% for ± 1σ in 2020, 4.16–30.19% for ± 1σ in 2021, and 3.39–32.81% for ± 1σ in 2022 compared to 2019. Average annual mobility was substantially decreased by 36% in 2020 and 24% in 2021 (until August) compared to 2019. Lastly, the results of the CO2 and NO2 ratio showed a decreasing trend from the first of January 2020 until the end of 2022 compared with the same period in 2019. This research sheds light on the influence of enforced socio-economic restrictions on NO2 levels, CO2 emissions, and traffic, offering valuable insights for policymakers in crafting effective strategies.

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Data availability

Mobility data using Apple mobility trends for several modes, including driving, transit, and walking, are available at https://covid19.apple.com/mobility. Traffic congestion for 2019, 2020, and 2021 using Tomtom Traffic Index are available at https://www.tomtom.com/en_gb/traffic-index/. Global nitrogen dioxide emissions data are available at https://waqi.info/. NO2 concentrations data from 1970 to 2015 are available at https://edgar.jrc.ec.europa.eu/country_profile/EU28. CO2 emission data for several sectors are available at https://carbonmonitor.org/. CO2 emission data from 1965 to 2019 are available at https://edgar.jrc.ec.europa.eu/report_2020.

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Acknowledgements

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Civil Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Buraimi, Al Buraimi, Oman

    M. A. Sahraei

  2. Department of Physics and Astronomy, Faculty of Science, University of Turku, 20014, Turku, Finland

    B. Ziaei

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  2. B. Ziaei
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Contributions

MAS contributed to conceptualization, methodology, data collection, analysis and visualization, writing original draft, and approved the final manuscript. BZ contributed to conceptualization, methodology, data collection, analysis and visualization, writing original draft, and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to M. A. Sahraei.

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Editorial responsibility: M.Shabani.

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Sahraei, M.A., Ziaei, B. Impact of COVID-19 force confinement for CO2 emission, NO2 concentration, and daily traffic congestion throughout EU nations and the United Kingdom (UK). Int. J. Environ. Sci. Technol. 21, 5617–5636 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13762-023-05391-w

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