Nielsen in EHP on Encouraging PM2.5 Trends in China

February 29, 2016
Nielsen in EHP on Encouraging PM2.5 Trends in China

Project Executive Director Chris NIELSEN is quoted in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives regarding satellite-based evidence that annual average PM2.5 concentrations have declined throughout most of China since 2007, contrary to widespread popular perceptions. 

Nielsen comments that the new findings from the study, led by colleagues MA Zongwei and LIU Yang of Emory University, are consistent with effects of various factors on air quality, and match the timing of actual Chinese pollution controls modeled in the China Project’s book Clearer Skies Over China. He also points out that annual averages need not necessarily trend in the same direction as headline-grabbing discrete episodes of severe PM2.5, reflecting the inherent complexity of transport and chemistry in the atmospheric environment.