Climate, health, agricultural and economic impacts of tighter vehicle-emission standards

• Published in: Nature climate change 2011-04, Vol.1 (1), p.59-66
• Main Authors: Shindell, Drew, Faluvegi, Greg, Walsh, Michael, Anenberg, Susan C., Van Dingenen, Rita, Muller, Nicholas Z., Austin, Jeff, Koch, Dorothy, Milly, George
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: 704/844/2739; Air pollution; Air quality; Carbon; Carbon dioxide emissions; Climate Change; Climate Change/Climate Change Impacts; Climate models; Developing countries; Earth and Environmental Science; Economic impact; Emission standards; Emissions; Environment; Environmental Law/Policy/Ecojustice; Food security; Freshwater; LDCs; Motor vehicles; Outdoor air quality; Pollutants; Quality standards; Trends; Vehicles; VOCs; Volatile organic compounds
• ISSN: 1758-678X; 1758-6798
• DOI: 10.1038/nclimate1066

Non-CO 2 air pollutants from motor vehicles have traditionally been controlled to protect air quality and health, but also affect climate. We use global composition–climate modelling to examine the integrated impacts of adopting stringent European on-road vehicle-emission standards for these pollutants in 2015 in many developing countries. Relative to no extra controls, the tight standards lead to annual benefits in 2030 and beyond of 120,000–280,000 avoided premature air pollution-related deaths, 6.1–19.7 million metric tons of avoided ozone-related yield losses of major food crops, $US0.6–2.4 trillion avoided health damage and $US1.1–4.3 billion avoided agricultural damage, and mitigation of 0.20 (+0.14/−0.17) °C of Northern Hemisphere extratropical warming during 2040–2070. Tighter vehicle-emission standards are thus extremely likely to mitigate short-term climate change in most cases, in addition to providing large improvements in human health and food security. These standards will not reduce CO 2 emissions, however, which is required to mitigate long-term climate change. Vehicle-emission standards for non-carbon-dioxide pollutants have recognized benefits for air quality. An interdisciplinary analysis now shows that adopting tight on-road emission standards for these pollutants would also mitigate short-term climate change and provide large benefits for human health and food security in a number of developing countries.