The coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic is first and foremost an issue of human health and safety. But as people have changed their everyday behaviors and patterns to contain or avoid the virus, there have been some subtle effects on the environment. There also has been misinformation. Below are four ways the virus is—and is not—affecting the environment in China.
1. Satellites found decreases in one air pollutant, but that doesn’t mean the air is free of all pollution.
Image credit: Josh Stevens / NASA Earth Observatory
On February 28, we reported how decreases in industrial, transportation, and business activity since the coronavirus outbreak had reduced levels of atmospheric nitrogen dioxide (NO2) over China. But researchers note that a measurable change in one pollutant does not necessarily mean air quality is suddenly healthy across the country.
In February, news outlets reported unhealthy air pollution in Beijing, which was largely affected by airborne particulate pollution known as PM 2.5. As reported in the South China Morning Post, “weak winds, high humidity and a strong thermal inversion had trapped bad air in the city.” NASA satellites also showed a high load of airborne aerosols. Measurements of aerosol optical depth depict how the abundance of natural or manmade particles in the air prevents light from traveling through the atmosphere to the ground.
Beyond aerosol emissions, weather also plays an important role in determining air quality. NASA/USRA researcher Fei Liu notes that wind patterns and the height of the planetary boundary layer — the lowest layer of the troposphere near Earth’s surface — are important meteorological factors. Planetary boundary layer height influences how air pollution mixes vertically in the atmosphere. If the height of the boundary layer is high, then air pollutants can move higher into the atmosphere and concentrations will be lower near the ground (and vice versa). Liu and her colleagues are currently studying how changes in such meteorological factors may have influenced the decrease in NO2 before and during the quarantine.
For more information on NASA’s long-term measurements of nitrogen dioxide, please see this page.
2. During the quarantine, roads and transportation hubs are emptier.
It is no surprise that road traffic in China’s major cities has been lighter, as many people have been forced to stay home and public transportation has been shut down. Satellite imagery from Planet Labs captured scenes of reduced traffic and empty parking lots near the Wuhan train station and airport. Trains stopped running around January 22, when the first quarantines began. And compared to late January 2019, domestic flights within mainland China this year dropped by 60 to 70 percent.
3. Coal and oil industrial activities have dropped, so carbon dioxide emissions have also decreased.
A report in Carbon Brief stated that key industries in China were operating at much lower-than-normal levels during the quarantine. Oil refinery operations in Shandong province, for instance, were at their lowest since 2015. Average coal consumption at power plants also reached a four-year low. As a result, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions were at least 25 percent lower in the two weeks following the Lunar New Year compared to 2019. However, that decrease in CO2 emissions for two weeks would only reduce annual totals by approximately 1 percent.
4. There is no evidence that cremation ashes are increasing the levels of sulfur dioxide in the atmosphere.
In February 2020, a map floating around on social media showed increased sulfur dioxide (SO2) concentrations near Wuhan. Some news outlets prematurely speculated that the elevated levels of SO2 were due to an increase in human cremation.
The data for the map came from NASA’s GEOS earth system model and were not based on real-time observations of SO2. NASA’s Arlindo da Silva explained that while the GEOS model assimilates many ground-based and satellite observations to constrain meteorological conditions such as winds, humidity, and temperature, it currently does not ingest any real-time observations of sulfur dioxide. In the model, the concentrations of SO2 are estimated from historical emissions sources that are transported around the globe by atmospheric circulation. Therefore, da Silva said, GEOS model simulations cannot account for variations in SO2 concentrations arising from a sudden change in human activity (like a quarantine). Essentially, the model output of enhanced SO2 was not completely reflecting reality in this case.
Secondly, as the writers at Snopes pointed out, sulfur dioxide is commonly associated with burning coal — not burning human corpses.
I saw the image changes for China as a result of the covid19. I would like to see the same kind of images for other parts of the world. Do you have that available on your website somewhere?
The Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS) has monitored reduced levels of PM2.5 likely linked to the precautions in Hubei province – https://atmosphere.copernicus.eu/amid-coronavirus-outbreak-copernicus-monitors-reduction-particulate-matter-pm25-over-china
Can you post photos also from other parts of the world? Like Europe and United States?
Please Join to Share our Facebook Page: People need to see the positives so when they reenter society they take with them the memory of a clean Earth and put procedures into place to mimic it and help save the our beautiful, exhausted planet!!!!
Which is the page on Facebook?
Not everyone has nor uses Facebook! Is it too much to include the rest of us by posting the information on YOUR website? Why even have a website if you are determined to use it only to tell people to look for the answer on a different site owned by you? You are wasting everybody’s time by sending us all on “wild goose chases”. My time is just as valuable as yours. Stop wasting it and be socially responsible by posting the information on YOUR WEBSITE so the rest of us who do not have nor use Facebook can be informed!
SO coronavirus started by 2019 but medical professionals didn’t actually knew that they first thought that
It’s pneumonia , so they were treating lots of sick people and , while doctors and professionals were trying to treat people this pneumonia disease ( CORONA VIRUS , COVID – 19 ) was spreading in WUHAN and day day by day people were getting this disease and this illness was spreading and people in WUHAN were living there life normally as there’s nothing but in fact people were dying and nobody knew that it’s CORONA VIRUS . Actually pneumonia disease is ; inflammation of the lung caused by bacteria , in which the air sacs ( alveoli ) become filled with inflammatory cells and the lung becomes solid . The symptoms include those of any infection : ( fever , malaise , headache ) together with cough and chest pain .
Agree. Im a millenial and do not have social media. Would be nice to see it here.
Amy – if you just want to look at pictures go to google, type what you want to see in the search box, hit enter, and then click the images tab. This site has information and a work cited. It would behoove you to keep using this site for data. Facebook is a social media platform and a Facebook page can produce more pictures more quickly that while the experts you are complaining about continue to collect data. It’s simple math. Do I need to explain further?
I’d like to follow the face book page please if you could supply the name or link
I was thinking 2-3 weeks per yr, any little bit helps though!
Have you seen what a one week holiday would be like for the earth?
@holidayforearth on IG
Here’s a more recent EO article about Italy: https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/blogs/earthmatters/2020/03/13/airborne-nitrogen-dioxide-decreases-over-italy/
Check data from ESA (European Space Agency)
https://www.esa.int/Applications/Observing_the_Earth/Copernicus/Sentinel-5P/Coronavirus_lockdown_leading_to_drop_in_pollution_across_Europe
As earlier posts, please share similar photos on a global level.
Thank you
I’ve been staring out my window for the last 15 years and I’ve never seen the air so clear even with my cataracts it looks beautiful so maybe everybody in the world should take it two weeks vacation and shut everything down To save the earth from climate change
Seems there have been some interesting side effects since world slowdown, I am not an envirimentalist but I hope the people who monitor this stuff are on the ball, and the data they report is true and not just self serving. This opportunity to monitor this once in a lifetime event will as Patton once said” spin off in to history” I guess the real challenge will be how to use the data and convince the people who can implement the data to effect change to make changes.
hey skip!
we are all environmentalists by default)
without our careful stewardship of earth systems we are all doomed.
Best wishes
Can you post images of Kurdistan , we have had a three day curfew . Would love to see the difference on air pollution
Kürdistan resimlerini görmen için ilk önce Kürdistan diye bir devletin olması gerekiyor aslanım benim
We would like to see the same kind of photos for Spain, if it is possible.
We are in a state of alarm and we can’t leave our house, everybody are at home.
Thank you,
Núria
Covid-19: Globally, authorities have confirmed more than 170,000 cases of the coronavirus; 77,786 recovereds and more than 6,500 deaths.
Please keep the atmospheric effects pictures and graphs coming in for our Climate awareness campaigns. We need to encourage people to learn better habits as a result of the Covid19 measures and gain hope for a better future.
As humans are spraying millions of liters of Corona Disinfectant on our streets, buildings, and homes. How is that affecting pets, livestock, and eventually our seas & rivers as it runs off?
You know the saying “the good with the bad”.
I would love to also see the changes before and after!
It seems reasonable to say that the increase in atmospheric water content, as an effect of climate change, may correlate with the migration of the corona virus around the globe. Any comments?
What if the virus survived the cremation process, and was somehow dispersed as particulate matter? Do you have a video showing how long air pollution from China might take to reach Italy? And Iran? And so on? Do you have thermometers strong enough to take body temperatures of the masses? Can we see clusters of people with fevers? It rained in Wisconsin yesterday, and there was a big spike in confirmed cases here (so I was told). Could those two things have any correlation? PS. We love the images.
a natureza está muito agradecida ao coronavirus porque reduziu ao seu habitat natural (as cavernas) aqueles que mais poluem o planeta (os humanos) obrigada coronavirus apesar de querer- te longe de mim, estás a ajudar todo o planeta, coisa que os humanos na sua ganãncia não fazem
Now China has given the “greenlight” for factories to mass produce without any environmental constraint. It would be interesting and dreadful to see a comparison picture of the air quality before, during, and after the Corona virus pandemic.
We invite all the participants across the world to attend the International Conference on Global Warming and Natural Disasters during June 01-02, 2020 Sydney, Australia. The theme of the conference is “Alarming Signs of Global Warming!! Preventive solutions towards climate catastrophe” and to encourage young minds and their research abilities by providing an opportunity to meet the experts in the field of Global Warming and Natural Disasters. Global Warming Congress 2020.
Hello, what is the effect of this change of habits on climate change? Are there good news on that front?
What effect of atmospheric temprature been noticed on Novel Corona spread & over itself ?
So to my knowledge, the Covid-19 is effecting all countries all over the world right now as we speak. China has gotten better and the united states have gotten worse we have more confirmed cases than both China and Italy. Then again I feel everyone is suffering as this pandemic, unfortunately, gets worse. I feel that this virus that cannot be cured at the moment has a lot of not only people suffering from illness and changing their everyday lives, It’s not a surprise to me that it is also affecting our earth in many ways explained in this article. I think that these changes will possibly stay the same for a while after the world goes back to “normal” because I feel things like this don’t just go away so easily it takes time. I think that it is absolutely outstanding that china has gotten better considering that is the place the virus came from in the first place but why do you think they’ve gotten better and as the United States still stands at a worse position? In my opinion, this is because they have attempted to make a change by shutting all workplaces down and imposed travel and quarantine restrictions on broad swaths. As they are making all these changes and some states in the United States have not still. I think the United States needs to do more things to try and help our economy while we can.
That’s if you believe China I think they have 2 million cases maybe more
Do you have something about India or near by related to pollution / environment ?
How it will impact Indian Economy as compared to others ?
How it will impact Chinese economy ?
Please share some statistics ?
Any update on rational relatedness of positions of Moon and Planet Saturn on April 5th 2020 at IST 9:09 PM with diminishing affect of Corona virus threat.
COVID 19 and the fate of human population is related with the end to end life expectancy and fatality of confirmed cases and with the serial interval of infection inflicted to the population chain. Trade off between transmission of covid 19 and degradation of climate is generally inversely related or having not affected rarely created as a sudden symptom of newly originated virus. Experimentally, China’s evidence of fatality in this common disease and Italy’s negligence and unawareness for the same tragedy of China have a bitter effect to the rest of the other world. We have the lack of literacy in health hygiene and risk of fair elements of climate under some constraints. Whatever ,it may be referred to as density disease of culmination in the earth. Our immune systems and insulation of health are regulated through our consumption habits and availability of nutrients in the natural environment. Ecosystems of the earth and biodiversity transforms while environment transforms simultaneously. Outbreaks of disease simultaneously in several dimension of the earth it turns in to an pandemic obviously. Environment may be the key element directly or indirectly while the matter of circumstances regulated. Let us bring a common effort to get the remedies from the endangered Covid 19.
The data from the geos earth system model was pretty cool
I think it is because it’s infecting lots of people their is several cases .
Do u have any pictures of it in mexico?
It’s good for human and Non human beings. If we didn’t polluting the invernoment then invernoment didn’t harm us.
This is really good for every one if we understand now a days I very better for future.
May all beings be happy be peaceful be liberated.
Killing viruses by rays
By detecting the frequency and wavelength and intensity of the radiation, it is possible to deal with viruses with a wide satellite coverage.
#covi̇d19 #coronavirus#koronavirus#kovid19
@deutschheidkari
Very informative blog. Keep up with good work.
Is quarantine preventing other commonly occurring diseases like common cold or diarrhoea? If yes what other diseases would be affected by the concept of social distancing?
honesly corona has did the world bad but personally i think its a good thing bc there is not as much pollution .
I am doing a master in environmental management, and currently working on a paper to publish soon. the paper content will be all advantages and disadvantages of the Covid-19 pandemic to the environment, so I am looking for a supporter to help me regarding writing a scientific research paper that can publish it ASAP and could be part of publishment as co-author. if there is anyone who is interested please contact me.
Regards,
Esmatullah Khyber
I am quite interested, what would I need to write and when is the deadline?
Kind Regards,
Gruffudd Jones
this article is about the COVID -19 and how it affects different places like china and wuhan etc. also i shows how the Coronavirus affected all states.
Hey Kasha,
Amazingly described!! I personally think that while this pandemic nature got the time to heal up again which could not be possible if we, humans were there. So, Sometimes bad situations are also benefited.
For our climate awareness campaigns please keep the images and charts of the atmospheric effects. With the Covid19 steps, we will inspire people to know more and build confidence for a better future.
‘Thanks for such a nice blog
Informative one. Thank you for sharing this much info.
Covid-19 gave us many shades of life. Indeed, it was an intolerable consequence but also healed the world that we killed. It’s the life circle. We just need to take the vital steps according to the situation. And we need to consider what the world needs from us, what nature wants.
Ϝantastіc post һowever I ᴡas wanting to know if you could write a litte more on this subject?
I’d be very thankful if you could elaborate a little bit more.
Bless y᧐u!