Air deterioration caused by pollution has harmed public health. The existing studies on the economic loss caused by a variety of air pollutants in multiple cities are lacking. To understand the effect of different pollutants on public health and to provide the basis of the environmental governance for governments, based on the dose–response relation and the willingness to pay, this paper used the latest available data of the inhalable particulate matter (PM10) and sulphur dioxide (SO2) from January 2015 to June 2015 in 74 cities by establishing the lowest and the highest limit scenarios. The results show that (1) in the lowest and highest limit scenario, the health-related economic loss caused by PM10 and SO2 represented 1.63 and 2.32 % of the GDP, respectively; (2) For a single city, in the lowest and the highest limit scenarios, the highest economic loss of the public health effect caused by PM10 and SO2 was observed in Chongqing; the highest economic loss of the public health effect per capita occurred in Hebei Baoding. The highest proportion of the health-related economic loss accounting for GDP was found in Hebei Xingtai. The main reason is that the terrain conditions are not conducive to the spread of air pollutants in Chongqing, Baoding and Xingtai, and the three cities are typical heavy industrial cities that are based on coal resources. Therefore, this paper proposes to improve the energy structure, use the advanced production process, reasonably control the urban population growth, and adopt the emissions trading system in order to reduce the economic loss caused by the effects of air pollution on public health.
Jiaozuo is a typical resource-based city, and its economic transformation has been an example of success in China. However, quantitative evaluation of the city’s development has scarcely been performed, and future development is not clear. Because of this, using the relevant data from 1999 to 2013, this paper uses the data envelopment analysis (DEA) model to evaluate development after the transformation of Jiaozuo with the aim of providing a basis for its future developing plan. The results show that DEA was effective in 2000, 2004, 2006, 2010, and 2012, was weakly effective in 1999, 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2013, and was ineffective in 2005, 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2011. By evaluating the development of Jiaozuo, this paper provides policy implications for Jiaozuo’s sustainable development, and it may serve as a reference for the sustainable development of China’s other resources-based cities.
Coal takes up an important position in China's energy structure. The relationship between coal resource, economic growth and environment protection has been in focus in recent research. However, both research methods and research scope need to be expanded to promote the practical effects of research results, especially studies concerning China's situation. Here we present a detailed basis for policy making with the following objectives: (1) to examine the relationship between coal development and economic growth in China with multiple linear regression model, using the data from 1997 to 2010 and the indices of the output of raw coal, the gross value of coal industrial output, the new investment in fixed assets of coal, gross domestic product and the gross value of industrial output and (2) to measure the environmental loss caused by coal mining and washing with the given model of environmental damage cost based on the data of 2010 and the indices of waste water, waste gas, waste residues, crop loss, land resource and soil deterioration. The research results show that there is a significant positive correlation between coal development and economic growth in China. The total environmental loss in coal mining and washing in 2010 took up approximately 2.7 % of the average price of coal. Our study recommends that Chinese government and coal companies should (1) keep moderate speed in coal production; (2) increase investment in technology innovation so as to reduce the environmental damage; and (3) increase environment tax.
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