Air pollution from fossil fuels linked to about 5 million deaths a year, study finds
- China was found to have the highest death toll related to air pollution, followed by India
- Scientists have urged countries to phase out fossil fuels ‘to improve health and save lives’
Replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy sources could prevent around 5 million extra deaths per year from air pollution worldwide – most of them in China and India – a new study has found.
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“Phasing out fossil fuels is deemed to be an effective intervention to improve health and save lives as part [of] the United Nations’ goal of climate neutrality by 2050,” the team wrote in an article published in peer-reviewed journal The BMJ on Wednesday.
“Ambient air pollution would no longer be a leading environmental health risk factor if the use of fossil fuels were superseded by equitable access to clean sources of renewable energy,” the scientists from institutes in Britain, Germany, Spain and the United States said.
According to the International Energy Agency, 29 per cent of electricity worldwide was generated by renewables in 2020. China is expected to account for nearly 55 per cent of global additions of renewable power capacity in 2023 and 2024.
At the UN Climate Change Conference, which began on Thursday, countries are expected to take stock of progress on the Paris Agreement, which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
Beijing and Washington agreed in November to include methane in their respective 2035 emission-cutting plans – the first time China has made such a pledge – and to work together to control other non-CO2 greenhouse gas emissions, as well as curb forest loss and plastic pollution.
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The latest study “provides new evidence to motivate rapid fossil fuel phase-out”, which should be high on the agenda at Cop28, according to lead author Jos Lelieveld, director of the Atmospheric Chemistry Department at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Germany.
“Air pollution in China, even though it has decreased in the past decade, to a large degree depends on fossil fuel use, which has increased in the same period,” Lelieveld said.
“The population is ageing, which is extending the period of exposure, leading to chronic diseases, which especially affect the elderly.”
He said fine particulate matter (mostly PM2.5) and oxidants (mostly ozone) can deeply penetrate the lungs, causing respiratory and cardiovascular disease as well as cancer. Long-term exposure to air pollution also causes or worsens chronic diseases that lead to mortality.
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In an accompanying editorial in The BMJ, scientists from the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare and the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, who were not involved in the study, urged “country leaders to commit to an accelerated, just and equitable phase-out of fossil fuels” at Cop28.
“High-income countries must agree to lead the way. Although climate-related impacts of such a transition are evident, Lelieveld and colleagues show that such a strategy would also save lives by reducing air pollution,” the editorial said.
“The benefits of fossil fuel phase-out on global health, in addition to the climate, must be recognised and play a key role in shaping discussions at Cop28.”
