Abstract
We present a European dataset of daily-, sector-, pollutant- and country-dependent emission adjustment factors associated to the COVID-19 mobility restrictions for the year 2020. The resulting dataset covers a total of nine emission sectors, including road transport, energy industry, manufacturing industry, residential and commercial combustion, aviation, shipping, off-road transport, use of solvents, and fugitive emissions from transportation and distribution of fossil fuels. The dataset was produced to be combined with the Copernicus CAMS-REG_v5.1 2020 business-as-usual (BAU) inventory, which provides high resolution (0.1 × 0.05 deg.) emission estimates for 2020 omitting the impact of the COVID-19 restrictions. The combination of both datasets allows quantifying spatially- and temporally-resolved reductions in primary emissions from both criteria pollutants (NOx, SO2, NMVOC, NH3, CO, PM10 and PM2.5) and greenhouse gases (CO2 fossil fuel, CO2 biofuel and CH4), as well as assessing the contribution of each emission sector and European country to the overall emission changes. Estimated overall emission changes in 2020 relative to BAU emissions were as follows: −10.5 % for NOx (−602 kt), −7.8 % (−260.2 Mt) for CO2 from fossil fuels, −4.7 % (−808.5 kt) for CO, −4.6 % (−80 kt) for SO2, −3.3 % (−19.1 Mt) for CO2 from biofuels, −3.0 % (−56.3 kt) for PM10, −2.5 % (−173.3 kt) for NMVOC, −2.1 % (−24.3 kt) for PM2.5, −0.9 % (−156.1 kt) for CH4 and −0.2 % (−8.6 kt) for NH3. The most pronounced drop in emissions occurred in April (up to −32.8 % on average for NOx) when mobility restrictions were at their maxima. The emission reductions during the second epidemic wave between October and December, were three to four times lower than those occurred during the Spring lockdown, as mobility restrictions were generally softer (e.g., curfews, limited social gatherings). Italy, France, Spain, the United Kingdom and Germany were, together, the largest contributors to the total EU27 + UK absolute emission decreases. At the sectoral level, the largest emission declines were found for aviation (−51 to −56 %), followed by road transport (−15.5 % to −18.8 %), the latter being the main driver of the estimated reductions for the majority of pollutants. The collection of COVID-19 emission adjustment factors (https://doi.org/10.24380/k966-3957, Guevara et al., 2022) and the CAMS-REG_v5.1 2020 BAU gridded inventory (https://doi.org/10.24380/eptm-kn40, Kuenen et al., 2022) have been produced in support of air quality modelling studies.
Highlights
40 The COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns and mobility restrictions implemented across Europe have resulted in an unprecedented drop in atmospheric anthropogenic emissions
We present a European dataset of daily, sector, pollutant- and country-dependent emission adjustment factors associated to the COVID-19 mobility restrictions for the year 2020
This assumption is in line with the results published by Elleby et al (2020), which indicate that COVID-19 implied a reduction of direct greenhouse gases (GHGs) from agriculture of only about 1% at the global scale
Summary
40 The COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns and mobility restrictions implemented across Europe have resulted in an unprecedented drop in atmospheric anthropogenic emissions. Using satellite and in situ observations, several studies have reported the associated changes in air pollutants (e.g., Balamuguran et al, 2021; Barré et al, 2021; Grange et al, 2021; Petetin et al, 2020; Querol et al, 2021; Slezakova and Pereira, 2021), mostly focusing on main criteria pollutants Further insights that complement these observational studies can be obtained by quantifying the changes in primary emissions. Such quantification can unlock many possibilities for numerical modelling studies, which require gridded emissions that account for the effect of the pandemic. The number of studies tackling the impact of COVID-19 upon primary emissions is low compared to those focusing on air quality. The first two focus on estimating the impact of the lockdowns on CO2 emissions, while the other two quantify emission declines for both
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