Heating price control and air pollution in China: Evidence from heating daily data in autumn and winter

Abstract

The air pollution index in northern hina rises sharply every autumn and winter. However, few relevant studies have focused on what causes this situation. In this paper, we used the daily meteorological and major air pollutants data of 21 cities in North China plain to study whether heating will aggravate air pollution. The results show that more than half of the major air pollutants in northern China come from coal-fired heating in autumn and winter. Heating will cause AQI, PM2.5, PM10 and SO2 to increase 1.4 times, 1.9 times, 1.5 times and 0.9 times respectively compared to the seasonal average. Due to the government's control over heating prices, direct changes in coal prices are not transmitted to consumers, so direct changes in coal prices will not affect the level of air pollution. However, it is very interesting that the change in the price gap between high-quality coal and low-quality coal can effectively affect the concentration of air pollutants. This may be due to changes in the behavior of non-central heating users. During the heating season, when the price gap between high-calorie coal and low-calorie coal becomes larger, the concentration of air pollutants will increase. Therefore, it is necessary to carry out a market-oriented reform of heating prices while improving energy efficiency in the future.