Increased ozone pollution alongside reduced nitrogen dioxide concentrations during Vienna’s first COVID-19 lockdown: Significance for air quality management

Brancher, Marlon

doi:10.1016/j.envpol.2021.117153

Cited by 50 publications

(37 citation statements)

References 76 publications

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“…Ozone levels compared to 2019 have generally increased by about 11% (− 48 to + 88%), which is consistent with various studies [ 36 – 38 , 40 ]. Two studies in Barcelona, Spain [ 76 ], and Rajasthan, India [ 77 ], showed that, during the lockdown period, ozone concentrations were increased by about 50% and 45%, respectively.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Air quality index variation before and after the onset of COVID-19 pandemic: a comprehensive study on 87 capital, industrial and polluted cities of the world

et al. 2021

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Background Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic provided an opportunity for the environment to reduce ambient pollution despite the economic, social and health disruption to the world. The purpose of this study was to investigate the changes in the air quality indexes (AQI) in industrial, densely populated and capital cities in different countries of the world before and after 2020. In this ecological study, we used AQI obtained from the free available databases such as the World Air Quality Index (WAQI). Bivariate correlation analysis was used to explore the correlations between meteorological and AQI variables. Mean differences (standard deviation: SD) of AQI parameters of different years were tested using paired-sample t-test or Wilcoxon signed-rank test as appropriate. Multivariable linear regression analysis was conducted to recognize meteorological variables affecting the AQI parameters. Results AQI-PM2.5, AQI-PM10 and AQI-NO2 changes were significantly higher before and after 2020, simultaneously with COVID-19 restrictions in different cities of the world. The overall changes of AQI-PM2.5, AQI-PM10 and AQI-NO2 in 2020 were – 7.36%, – 17.52% and – 20.54% compared to 2019. On the other hand, these results became reversed in 2021 (+ 4.25%, + 9.08% and + 7.48%). In general, the temperature and relative humidity were inversely correlated with AQI-PM2.5, AQI-PM10 and AQI-NO2. Also, after adjusting for other meteorological factors, the relative humidity was inversely associated with AQI-PM2.5, AQI-PM10 and AQI-NO2 (β = − 1.55, β = − 0.88 and β = − 0.10, P < 0.01, respectively). Conclusions The results indicated that air quality generally improved for all pollutants except carbon monoxide and ozone in 2020; however, changes in 2021 have been reversed, which may be due to the reduction of some countries’ restrictions. Although this quality improvement was temporary, it is an important result for planning to control environmental pollutants.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Air quality index variation before and after the onset of COVID-19 pandemic: a comprehensive study on 87 capital, industrial and polluted cities of the world

et al. 2021

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“…In a striking contrast, the changes in ozone concentration on weekends did not differ substantially from the baseline period (<2% difference), and, for weekdays, ozone concentrations increased by 10-15%, with the larger increase for TW. The increase in ozone while NO and NO 2 decreased is consistent with other pandemic results [21,37,45,50], a point explored in greater detail in the hourly analysis. Figures 5 and 6 depict, for Toronto East and Toronto West, respectively, nitrous oxide, NO, for 2020 (WE 2020, WD 2020), relative to the baseline values (WE, WD).…”

Section: Datasupporting

confidence: 87%

“…A clear signal emerged with NO and NO 2 values being the lowest for both locations independent of weekday and weekend. This is consistent with the substantial reduction in vehicular traffic during the first lockdown of the COVID pandemic and Adams (2020), as well as with other COVID-19 pandemic analyses [21,37,45,46,50]. The ozone results were more nuanced.…”

Section: Ranking Analysissupporting

confidence: 84%

“…The interplay between NO 2 and VOCs dictates the effectiveness of remediation strategies resulting from two potential precursor states, NOx-saturated (VOC-limited) or VOC-saturated (NOxlimited) [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18]. For NOx saturated environments, a reduction in NOx relative to VOCs leads to greater ozone production and vice versa [18][19][20][21].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The COVID-19 pandemic of 2020-2022 provides an opportunity to examine ozone production under conditions of substantially reduced NOx emissions and a weaker emissions distinction between weekdays and weekends. Recently published work indicated a substantial reduction of NO and NO 2 throughout the world, but the signal for ozone has been less ubiquitous in many regions, with higher ozone concentrations during the first wave of the pandemic [21,[36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50]. This work examines the behavior of ozone and NOx during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic that hit the Greater Toronto Area (April to June of 2020) with a particular focus on the impact on the weekend/weekday effect.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Changing Air Quality and the Ozone Weekend Effect during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Gough

Anderson

2022

Climate

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Air pollutants, NO, NO2, and O3, were examined from April to June 2020 and compared to a 10-year (2010–2019) climatology of these pollutants for two monitoring sites in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, coinciding with local lockdown measures during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. NO and NO2 values were lower than any of the preceding 10 years at the two Toronto sites for both weekdays and weekends. Ozone concentrations did not have a corresponding decrease and in fact increased for weekdays, similar to other parts of the world. The well-documented ozone weekend effect was considerably muted during the morning rush hour throughout this pandemic period. A Fisher exact test on hourly averaged data revealed statistically significant record hourly minimums for NO and NO2, but this was not found for ozone, consistent with the aggregate ranking results. These findings are likely the result of considerably reduced vehicular traffic during this time and ozone chemistry in a NOx-saturated (VOC limited) environment. This has important implications for ozone abatement strategies.

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Ambient Air Quality Within Urban Communities of South Africa

Matandirotya

Dangare

et al. 2023

Handbook of Sustainability Science in the Future

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Increased ozone pollution alongside reduced nitrogen dioxide concentrations during Vienna’s first COVID-19 lockdown: Significance for air quality management

Cited by 50 publications

References 76 publications

Air quality index variation before and after the onset of COVID-19 pandemic: a comprehensive study on 87 capital, industrial and polluted cities of the world

Air quality index variation before and after the onset of COVID-19 pandemic: a comprehensive study on 87 capital, industrial and polluted cities of the world

Changing Air Quality and the Ozone Weekend Effect during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Ambient Air Quality Within Urban Communities of South Africa

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