Marginal dip in PM 2.5 levels in 2022; year added to avg life expectancy: Report
Delhi residents will have maximum benefits, gaining 7.8 years of life expectancy if all of India were to reduce particulate pollution to meet the WHO annual guideline
Particulate pollution (PM 2.5) in India dropped marginally in 2022, adding one year to average life expectancy, the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago (EPIC)’s report titled Air Quality Life Index (AQLI) based on satellite data has said. The report suggested the drop in PM 2.5 concentrations in 2022 in South Asia may be linked to meteorological causes such as above-normal rainfall.
PM 2.5 concentrations in India dropped from 51.3 in 2021 to 41.4 µg/m³ in 2022, as per satellite data cited in AQLI. Despite the decline in pollution, all of India’s 1.4 billion people live in areas where the annual average particulate pollution level exceeds the World Health Organisation (WHO) guideline. The report said around 42.6% of the population live in areas exceeding the country’s national air quality standard of 40 µg/m³.
An average Indian was likely to live nine months longer compared to what they would have if they were exposed to levels similar to the last decade if these reductions were sustained. The report said if pollution in India met the WHO guideline, Indians could gain an additional 3.6 years in their life expectancy.
Delhi residents will have maximum benefits, gaining 7.8 years of life expectancy if all of India were to reduce particulate pollution to meet the WHO annual guideline of 5 micrograms per cubic metres. The report said residents would gain 3.6 years of life expectancy in West Bengal’s North 24 Parganas. As many as 540.7 million residents or 38.9% of India’s population in India’s most polluted region—the Indo-Gangetic plains—were on track to lose 5.4 years of life expectancy on average relative to the WHO guideline and 1.9 years relative to the national standard if current pollution levels persist.
The report found there was the highest decline in particulate pollution in 2022 in Purulia and Bankura in West Bengal and Dhanbad (Jharkhand). The pollution concentrations declined by more than 20 µg/m³ in these places. An average resident of these areas could live 2.3, 2.2, and 2 years longer if these reductions are sustained.
Pollution concentrations were also slightly lower in 2022 globally. The average person would add 1.9 years onto their life expectancy—or a combined 14.9 billion life-years saved worldwide—if the world were to permanently reduce PM 2.5 to meet the WHO guideline.
The report cited data and said it makes it clear that particulate pollution is the world’s greatest external risk to human health. “Its impact on life expectancy is comparable to that of smoking, more than 4 times that of high alcohol use, more than 5 times that of transport injuries like car crashes, and more than 6 times that of HIV/AIDS.”
The report said the pollution challenge worldwide is vastly unequal, with people living in the most polluted places on earth breathing air that is six times more polluted than the air breathed by those living in the least polluted places—and having their lives cut short by 2.7 years more because of it.
Milton Friedman Distinguished Service Professor in Economics Michael Greenstone, who is the creator of AQLI, highlighted the vast inequalities in how air pollution impacts people. “While air pollution remains a global problem, its largest impacts are concentrated in a relatively small number of countries—cutting lives short several years in some places and even more than 6 years in some regions,” said Greenstone.
Greenstone said all too often, high pollution concentrations reflect low ambition in setting policy or a failure to successfully enforce existing policies. “As countries balance their economic, health, and environmental goals, the AQLI will continue to shine a light on the longer lives that air pollution reductions deliver.”