Impacts of the clean residential combustion policies on environment and health in the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei area

Abstract

The Chinese government has implemented a series of air pollution control measures in the residential combustion sector, especially in the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei (BTH) area. The government launched the Three-year Action Plan for Winning the Blue Sky War in 2018. Cutting down the coal combustions in the residential sector has been highly addressed. To compare the environmental and health impacts, we set two scenarios: implementing the residential coal-switch policy and excluding the policy, through an integrated evaluation framework consisting of the GAINS IV Asia model and the IMED/HEL model. Results show that compared with the 2030 Baseline, emission of NOx, SO2, and PM2.5 in BTH would decline by 49.7 kt (3.8%), 216.2 kt (20.6%), and 199 kt (25.7%), respectively. Meanwhile, it leads to reductions of PM2.5 concentrations by 9.8 μg/m³ (19.9%), 3.1 μg/m³ (6.4%), 5.0 μg/m³ (10.7%) in Beijing, Tianjin, and Hebei, respectively. However, PM2.5 concentration in BTH would still exceed the World Health Organization Interim Target-1 of 35 μg/m3 by 2030. Carrying out the residential coal-switch policy can avoid 0.78 million morbidities (15.2%) and 0.01 million mortalities (5.6%) in BTH by 2030 compared to Baseline. Further, work time loss would decrease by 15.1% in 2030. The value of statistical life (VSL) of 9.58 billion USD (12.4%), 2.23 billion USD (3.8%), and 12.48 billion USD (6.6%) would be saved for Beijing, Tianjin, and Hebei by 2030. Regions with heavy pollution have benefited more from the clean residential combustion strategies and Hebei would account for 50.8%–62.3% of the total avoided health benefits in 2030. The benefit-cost ratio in Beijing is much higher than that in other regions. Implementing the residential coal-switch policies poses remarkable co-benefits on human health and the economy. This research lays a foundation for future environmental and health risks in other Chinese cities.