Abstract
Rapid urbanization has caused serious PM2.5 pollution. The existing researches mainly focus on the contribution of one aspect of urbanization to PM2.5 concentrations. However, few studies have comprehensively considered the direct and indirect effects of multi-dimensional urbanization on PM2.5 concentrations. In order to identify the impact of multi-dimensional urbanization on PM2.5 concentrations, the entropy-right method, the spatial lag model, spatial error model and spatial Durbin model were used to investigate the relationships between multi-dimensional urbanization and PM2.5 concentrations in 261 cities of China in 2016. Results demonstrated that the spillover effect of PM2.5 concentrations between different cities was significant. Economic urbanization had the strongest direct effect on PM2.5 concentrations. Social urbanization and ecological urbanization had a significantly negative impact on PM2.5 concentrations in local cities. However, the biggest indirect effect on PM2.5 concentrations in adjacent cities was social urbanization, followed by land urbanization. The direct and indirect effects of population urbanization on PM2.5 concentrations were non-significant and the least. The findings from this result analysis and discussion can be used as a theoretical basis to provide some policy suggestions for China's air governance and sustainable urban development.
Highlights
China has made extraordinary progress through a process of rapid urbanization on a massive scale in the past few decades
It’s worth noting that most of the cities with high PM2.5 pollution were located in economically developed cities, such as the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the Pearl
In the study, 261 cities in China were selected as a study area
Summary
China has made extraordinary progress through a process of rapid urbanization on a massive scale in the past few decades. Urbanization is an important feature of China’s current development and has become the main driving force of domestic demand driven by the transformation of China’s economic structure. Some human activities related to urbanization have caused serious environmental pollution [1], especially haze pollution [2]. Frequent hazy weather across the country has seriously affected residents’ physical and mental health [3], traffic safety [4] and regional climate [5]. PM2.5 (particulate matter with an aerodynamic equivalent diameter of 2.5 microns or less) is considered to be the ‘‘culprit’’ of haze weather [6].
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