Trade-driven changes in global air pollutant emissions during 2004-2017

Abstract

International trade is associated with air quality, public health, and climate change through redistributing air pollutant emissions. Global trade patterns have undergone significant changes in the past decade causing large changes in anthropogenic emissions. Revealing the long-term pattern change of trade-embedded emissions and identifying the driving factors that change the emissions could be key to enhancing international and economic-environmental cooperation. Here we quantify international trade-induced air pollutant emissions (including black carbon (BC), organic carbon (OC), carbon monoxide (CO), ammonia (NH3), non-methane volatile organic compounds (NMVOCs), sulfur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen oxides (NOx)) and assess the contribution of five driving factors from 2004 to 2017. The results indicate a reversal of growth in global trade-related BC, CO, and NOx emissions since 2011, while there is a continuous increase in NH3, NMVOC, and CO emissions. The domestic consumption-based emissions and emissions embodied in exports (EEE) except for NH3 and NMVOC in East Asia show a consistent trend with global trade-related emissions, having a considerable contribution to global emission change. Sustained rising domestic consumption-based emissions and EEE in South Asia, Southeast Asia and Africa show that further cooperative and coordinated mitigation efforts are needed.