In a major boost to air quality and sustainable development in Africa, a new UNEA 6 Resolution on Air Quality has acknowledged the Integrated Assessment of Air Pollution and Climate Change for Sustainable Development in Africa. The new development came in 2023, when the Integrated Assessment of Air Pollution and Climate Change for Sustainable Development in Africa (UNEP, 2023), was published by a partnership of the African Union, Climate and Clean Air Coalition and the United Nations Environment Programme. The assessment was developed with contributions from over 100 authors across Africa, in a process supported by the Stockholm Environment Institute (Kaudia et al. 2022). The Assessment recommended for an Africa Clean Air Program (ACAP) to provide a key rallying point for African multilateral institutions, the Regional Economic Communities (RECs) and Member States, and development partners to work collaboratively to implement the recommendations from the assessment and deliver multiple benefits of clean air for Africa.

Africa is highly vulnerable to climate change but emits a small portion of global greenhouse gases. Additionally, decarbonization might lead to a ‘climate penalty’ whereby reductions in cooling aerosols offset temperature benefits from CO 2 reductions for several decades. However, climate change impacts conditions other than temperatures, including precipitation. Using the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies climate model, we find that although African emissions cuts have weak impacts on projected African temperatures, they significantly impact rainfall. Whereas business-as-usual increasing emissions lead to substantial drying over tropical Northern Hemisphere Africa during local summer, that drying is essentially eliminated under a sustainable development pathway. The reduction in cooling aerosols is responsible for ~33–90% of the avoided drying in our model, with the remainder largely attributable to reduced absorbing aerosols. African policy choices may therefore greatly reduce regional African summer drying, giving parts of Africa substantial leverage over their own climate and air quality future.

Erratum to "The launch of the first-ever Integrated Assessment of Air Pollution and Climate Change for Sustainable Development in Africa" published in Clean Air Journal, 32(2), 2022, https://doi.org/10.17159/caj/2022/32/2.15320 The original article can be found here: https://cleanairjournal.org.za/article/view/15320

Globally, agriculture is a key source of both CO2 and non-CO2 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In China 41% of total GHG emissions (~3.5% of global GHG emissions) and 50% of non-CO2 GHG emissions are from agriculture. The large contribution of agriculture to overall emissions in China stems from the introduction of the 1987 Reform and Opening policy. The policy encouraged farm labourers to move to cities for better paid jobs. As a result agriculture became more reliant on fertiliser and machinery use, increasing agricultural emissions. Production and consumption, which are closely linked to emissions, are predicted to continue to increase according to the 10-year outlook. However, China has pledged to reach peak emissions by 2030. We simulate the impact of recent-past and future agricultural emissions on air pollutant concentrations using the WRF-Chem model. The Stockholm Environment Institute demand based agricultural emissions model, driven by 10 year outlook data, is used to provide Chinese agricultural emissions for 2017 and 2030. Three future scenarios are explored for 2030: 1) baseline, 2) baseline + on-farm measures 3) baseline + on-farm + demand side measures. We quantify the contribution of China’s current targets to 2030 air pollutant concentrations under the outlook projections (baseline). We also explore the additional pollutant reductions that could be achieved from on-farm (animal feed composition, rice water regimes, agricultural burning, proportion of synthetic fertiliser application etc.) and demand-based (population diet, food waste etc.) emissions reductions. Stakeholder engagement and a digital survey are used to inform on-farm emission reduction options and possible barriers to adoption. The impact of pollutant concentrations is also quantified on crop yields and human health using the Deposition of Ozone for Stomatal Exchange (DO3SE) model and disease-specific exposure-response functions, respectively.

Agriculture accounts for approximately 10% of global greenhouse gas emissions and is simultaneously associated with impacts on human health through food consumption, and agricultural air pollutant emissions. These impacts are often quantified separately, and there is a lack of modelling tools to facilitate integrated assessments. This work presents a new model that integrates assessment of agricultural systems on (i) human health indirectly through dietary, obesity and malnutrition health risks from food consumption, (ii) human health directly through exposure to air pollutants from agricultural emissions, and (iii) greenhouse gas emissions. In the model, national food demand is the starting point from which the livestock and crop production systems that meet this are represented. The model is applied for 2014–2018 to assess the robustness of the GHG emissions and health burden results that this integrated modelling framework produces compared to previous studies that have quantified these variables independently. Methane and nitrous oxide emissions globally in 2018 were estimated to be 129 and 4.4 million tonnes, respectively, consistent with previous estimates. Agricultural systems were also estimated to emit 44 million tonnes of ammonia. An estimated 4.1 million deaths were associated with dietary health risks, 6.0 million with overweight/obesity, and 730 thousand infant deaths from malnutrition, consistent with previous studies. Agricultural air pollutant emissions were estimated to be associated with 537 thousand premature deaths attributable to fine particulate matter (PM2.5) exposure, and 184 thousand premature deaths from methane-induced ground-level ozone. These health impacts provide substantial opportunities to design integrated strategies that mitigate climate change, and improve human health, and also highlight possible trade-offs that the expansion of agricultural production could have due to increased emissions. The model presented here provides for the consistent evaluation of the implications of different agricultural strategies to meet food demand while minimising human health and climate change impacts.

To limit global temperature increases to ‘well below 2 ºC’, it is necessary that current national commitments to reduce emissions are increased, and these commitments are implemented. The identification of local development benefits from climate change mitigation is a possible motivating factor to achieve this. However, there is a lack of practical examples of how climate change mitigation and development priorities can be integrated in national planning processes, particularly in low- and middle-income countries. This work considers two questions i) What are the factors that have to be considered when developing a plan integrating GHG reductions with local development goals?; and ii) How do you structure a process to reach a consensus about the plan itself?. It does this by conceptualising the integration of climate mitigation and development benefits as a policy intervention. As a case study, a national planning process that integrated climate change mitigation with improvements to air quality and human health in Nigeria is conceptualised, ex-post, as an intervention theory model. The key factors identified include the importance of tailoring the planning process to the national context of how development priorities are identified and then used in the allocation of national budgets. In particular, assessments undertaken within the planning process, of emission reductions, and development of implementation pathways provided necessary information on how climate mitigation actions contribute to national development priorities. Additionally, the importance of structuring these assessments within a planning processes that also engaged key stakeholders to allow the information produced by the assessments to be informed, and acted upon, by those responsible for mitigation in each key sector is also highlighted. Finally, approaches for the use of intervention theory as a conceptual framework to design a planning process, ex-ante, are discussed, to further optimise the integration of development priorities into climate change planning.

Renewable fuel standards for biofuels have been written into policy in the U.S. to reduce the greenhouse gas (GHG) intensity of transportation energy supply. Biofuel feedstocks sourced from within a regional market have the potential to also address sustainability goals. The U.S. Mid-Atlantic region could meet the advanced fuel designation specified in the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS2), which requires a 50% reduction in GHG emissions relative to a gasoline baseline fuel, through ethanol produced from winter barley (Hordeum vulgare L.). We estimate technology configurations and winter barley grown on available winter fallow agricultural land in six Mid-Atlantic states. Using spatially weighted stochastic GHG emission estimates for winter barley supply from 374 counties and biorefinery data from a commercial dry-grind facility design with multiple co-products, we conclude that winter barley would meet RFS2 goals even with the U.S. EPA’s indirect land use change estimates. Using a conservative threshold for soil GHG emissions sourced from barley produced on winter fallow lands in the U.S. MidAtlantic, a biorefinery located near densely populated metropolitan areas in the Eastern U.S. seaboard could economically meet the requirements of an advanced biofuel with the co-production of CO2 for the soft drink industry.

Low- and middle-income countries have the largest health burdens associated with air pollution exposure, and are particularly vulnerable to climate change impacts. Substantial opportunities have been identified to simultaneously improve air quality and mitigate climate change due to overlapping sources of greenhouse gas and air pollutant emissions and because a subset of pollutants, short-lived climate pollutants (SLCPs), directly contribute to both impacts. However, planners in low- and middle-income countries often lack practical tools to quantify the air pollution and climate change impacts of different policies and measures. This paper presents a modelling framework implemented in the Low Emissions Analysis Platform - Integrated Benefits Calculator (LEAP-IBC) tool to develop integrated strategies to improve air quality, human health and mitigate climate change. The framework estimates emissions of greenhouse gases, SLCPs and air pollutants for historical years, and future projections for baseline and mitigation scenarios. These emissions are then used to quantify i) population-weighted annual average ambient PM2.5 concentrations across the target country, ii) household PM2.5 exposure of different population groups living in households cooking using different fuels/technologies and iii) radiative forcing from all emissions. Health impacts (premature mortality) attributable to ambient and household PM2.5 exposure and changes in global average temperature change are then estimated. This framework is applied in Bangladesh to evaluate the air quality and climate change benefits from implementation of Bangladesh's Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) and National Action Plan to reduce SLCPs. Results show that the measures included to reduce GHGs in Bangladesh's NDC also have substantial benefits for air quality and human health. Full implementation of Bangladesh's NDC, and National SLCP Plan would reduce carbon dioxide, methane, black carbon and primary PM2.5 emissions by 25%, 34%, 46% and 45%, respectively in 2030 compared to a baseline scenario. These emission reductions could reduce population-weighted ambient PM2.5 concentrations in Bangladesh by 18% in 2030, and avoid approximately 12,000 and 100,000 premature deaths attributable to ambient and household PM2.5 exposures, respectively, in 2030. As countries are simultaneously planning to achieve the climate goals in the Paris Agreement, improve air quality to reduce health impacts and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, the LEAP-IBC tool provides a practical framework by which planners can develop integrated strategies, achieving multiple air quality and climate benefits.

The ACP White Paper 2020 offers policymakers pragmatic recommendations on how they can mobilise finance, strengthen policies, and build capacities to implement at scale many of the 25 solutions in UNEP’s Air Pollution in Asia and the Pacific: Science-based Solutions .

Low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) often lack the necessary tools, guidance, and capacity for compiling an emission inventory (EI) for air pollutants. A reliable EI is an important prerequisite for the identification of key emissions sources, as an input to modelling atmospheric transport and impacts of air pollutants, and the identification of appropriate mitigation policies. The publicly-available Global Atmospheric Pollution Forum Emission Inventory (GAPF-EI) tool meets the need of LMICs for a user-friendly tool allowing in-country practitioners to compile their own EIs. The species covered are SO2, NOX, CO, NMVOC, CH4, NH3, PM10, PM 2.5, black carbon, organic carbon and CO2. Output from the tool can therefore support the development of integrated air quality and climate change mitigation strategies. This tool incorporates default emission factors and inventory methods conforming with internationally recognised approaches. The GAPF-EI tool enables emissions to be estimated for technologies or practices that are often of little or no relevance to developed countries, but may represent key sources in LMICs. This paper describes the GAPF-EI tool and its application to Côte d’Ivoire where emissions from traditional biomass cookstoves, vegetation fires, traditional charcoal manufacture, road transport (including dust from unpaved roads) and open burning of municipal solid waste were found to be particularly important components of the inventory. The application of the GAPF-EI approach to Côte d’Ivoire has demonstrated its utility in addressing sources of particular relevance to LMICs in addition to providing a user-friendly, transparent and flexible EI preparation tool.