City Shape and Air Pollution

Johannes Gallé

No 1012, Ruhr Economic Papers from RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen

Abstract: Air pollution has become an increasing health threat for the local population in many cities around the world. Using high resolution remote sensing data on nightlights and fine particulate matter (PM2.5) for the years 1998-2013, I study the contemporary nexus between city shape and air pollution in India. I find that the compactness of a city has statistically significant and negative effects on local air quality. The results are more pronounced in larger cities and robust with respect to different compactness measures. While geographic dispersion allows for more fresh air corridors, differences in commuting patterns could serve as an additional explanation. People in less compact cities are more likely to use public transport and thereby reducing the overall road traffic within cities translating into less pollution. However, the statistically significant effects do not translate into substantial changes in the relative risk of PM2.5-induced diseases.

Keywords: Urbanization; air pollution; commuting; India (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q53 R10 R41 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ene, nep-env, nep-hea, nep-mfd, nep-tre and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/270957/1/REP-23-1012.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:rwirep:1012

DOI: 10.4419/96973178

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Ruhr Economic Papers from RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics ().