A preliminary assessment of the impact of COVID 19 on environment A case study of China
Abstract The coronavirus disease (COVID 19) is seriously threatening world public health security. Currently, >200 countries and regions have been affected by the epidemic, with the number of infections and deaths still increasing. As an extreme event, the outbreak of COVID 19 has greatly damaged the global economic growth and caused a certain impact on the environment. This paper takes China as a case study, comprehensively evaluating the dynamic impact of COVID 19 on the environment. The analysis results indicate that the outbreak of COVID 19 improves China's air quality in the short term and significantly contributes to global carbon emission reduction. However, in the long run, there is no evidence that this improvement will continue. When China completely lifts the lockdown and resumes large scale industrial production, its energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are likely to exceed the level before the event. Moreover, COVID 19 significantly reduces the concentration of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) in the atmosphere. The decline initially occurred near Wuhan and eventually spread to the whole country. The above phenomenon shows that the decreasing economic activities and traffic restrictions directly lead to the changes of China's energy consumption and further prevent the environment from pollution. The results in this study support the fact that strict quarantine measures can not only protect the public from COVID 19, but also exert a positive impact on the environment. These findings can provide a reference for other countries to assess the influence of COVID 19 on the environment.
Science of The Total Environment