Growth for cities in China and Japan

For decades, economic growth and fossil-fuel consumption have been tightly intertwined. As cities have expanded, rising prosperity has often been accompanied by worsening air pollution. New research, however, suggests that this relationship is changing – and satellite data are helping to prove it.

Using data from Europe’s Copernicus Sentinel-5P satellite mission together with information on gross domestic product (GDP), researchers have found that many of the world’s largest cities are now growing economically while reducing their emissions of the pollutant nitrogen dioxide.

The study, led by Norway’s NILU research institute and published recently in Nature Cities, analysed 2475 major urban areas around the world and found that almost 80% of them are achieving higher levels of prosperity alongside cleaner air.

The graphs show reductions in levels of nitrogen dioxide compared to growth in GDP for Shanghai, Beijing and Tokyo.

Read full story: Cleaner air and prosperity can go hand in hand