README

This repository contains codes for Huang et al. Effects of global climate mitigation on regional air quality and health. Nature Sustainability (2023). This code is developed by Xinyuan Huang and Dr. Vivek Srikrishnan, organized and reproduced by Sitara Baboolal, and also reproduced by Jinyu Shiwang.

Module Summary

• "GCAM ensemble" - Codes in this directory are used to generate an ensemble of states of the world (SOWs). The codes are produced by Dr. Vivek Srikrishnan.
  • Codes in "GCAM ensemble" are executed using Python 3.6.8.
• "Data and Codes" - Codes used to analyse the ensemble results and generate the figures.
  • Scripts provided in "Data and Codes/CODES/R_scripts" are executed using R 3.6.0 or R 4.1.2 (both available).
    • "dataExtraction.R" - script extracts data from the ensemble results. The generated data are available at http://zenodo.org/record/6975580. The can be stored in the "Data and Codes/DATA" folder.
    • The "downscaling.R" - script can be used to downscale emissions from GCAM's 32 regional resolution to the country level using the Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research (EDGAR v4.3) as calibration.
    • "healthImpacts.R" - script performs the air quality modeling using the TM5-FASST model, and the health impact assessments.
  • Scripts and instructions provided in "Data and Codes/CODES/Huang_etal_2023/" are used to replicate results from paper.
    • For the steps needed to replicate the exact results and figures presented, please follow /Data and Codes/CODES/Huang_etal_2023/README.md.
    • "main_text.R" - script generates figures for the research paper.
    • Example figures are provided in Data and Codes/CODES/Huang_etal_2023/Figures/" for comparison

Huang et al.

Effects of global climate mitigation on regional air quality and health. Nature Sustainability (2023).
Xinyuan Huang¹ , Vivek Srikrishnan² , Jonathan Lamontagne³ , Klaus Keller⁴ , and Wei Peng,^1,5*

¹ Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

² Department of Biological and Environmental Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA

³ Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Tufts University, Medford, MA, USA

⁴ Thayer School of Engineering, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, USA

⁵ School of International Affairs, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

Abstract

Climate mitigation can bring air quality and health co-benefits. How these health impacts might be distributed across countries remains unclear. Here we use a coupled climate–energy–health model to assess the country-varying health effects of a global carbon price across nearly 30,000 future states of the world (SOWs). As a carbon price lowers fossil fuel use, our analysis suggests consistent reductions in ambient fine particulate matter (PM_2.5) levels and associated mortality risks in countries that currently suffer most from air pollution. For a few less-polluted countries, however, a carbon price can increase the mortality risks under some of the considered SOWs due to emissions increases from bioenergy use and land-use changes. These potential health co-harms are largely driven in our model by the scale and method of deforestation. A robust and quantitative understanding of these distributional outcomes requires improved representations of relevant deep uncertainties, country-specific characteristics and cross-sector interactions.

Journal reference

Huang et al. Effects of global climate mitigation on regional air quality and health. Nature Sustainability (2023). https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-023-01133-5.

Code reference

Xinyuan Huang, vxhuang/CarbonPrice: Codes for Huang et al. Effects of global climate mitigation on regional air quality and health. Nature Sustainability (2023). Zenodo, May 3, 2023. https://zenodo.org/record/7894050.