Abstract
The Yangtze River Delta (YRD), China’s main cultural and economic center, has become one of the most seriously polluted areas in the world with respect to nitrogen oxides (NOx), owing to its rapid industrialization and urbanization, as well as substantial coal consumption. On the basis of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) density data from ozone monitoring instrument (OMI) and ground-based observations, the effects of industrial fluctuations due to the financial crisis on local NO2 pollution were quantitatively assessed. The results were as follows. (1) A distinct V-shaped fluctuation of major industrial products, thermal generating capacity, electricity consumption, and tropospheric NO2 densities was associated with the global financial crisis from May 2007 to December 2009, with the largest anomalies 1.5 times more than standard deviations at the height of the crisis period from November 2008 to February 2009. (2) Among all industrial sectors, thermal power plants were mainly responsible for fluctuations in local NO2 pollution during the crisis period. Thermal generating capacity had its greatest decrease of 12.10% at the height of the crisis compared with that during November 2007–February 2008, leading to local tropospheric NO2 density decreasing by 16.97%. As the crisis appeased, thermal generating capacity increased by 29.63% from November 2009 to February 2010, and tropospheric NO2 densities correspondingly increased by 30.07%. (3) Among all industrial sectors in the YRD, the thermal power sector has the greatest coal consumption of about 65.96%. A decline in thermal power of about 10% can induce a decrease of about 30% in NOx emissions and NO2 densities, meaning that a relative small fluctuation in industrial production can lead to a large decrease in tropospheric NO2 densities over industrially developed areas like the YRD region. Since electricity is mainly obtained from local coal-burning thermal plants without NOx-processing equipment, installing NOx-removal devices for all thermal power plants is an important and feasible way of controlling local NOx pollution at present.
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Supported by the National Basic Research and Development (973) Program of China (2015CB453200), National Natural Science Foundation of China (41205063 and 41475084), Special Project for Development of Key Forecasting Technology (CMAHX20160404), Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province (BK2011831 and BK2012888), and Special Climate Change Project of the China Meteorological Administration (CCSF201411).
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Du, Y., Xie, Z. Global financial crisis making a V-shaped fluctuation in NO2 pollution over the Yangtze River Delta. J Meteorol Res 31, 438–447 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13351-017-6053-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13351-017-6053-2