Air Pollution During Growth: Accounting for Governance and Vulnerability

New research on urban air pollution casts doubt on the conventional view of the relationship between economic growth and environmental quality. This view holds that pollution automatically increases until societies reach middle-income status becaus...

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Main Authors:	Dasgupta, Susmita, Hamilton, Kirk, Pandey, Kiran, Wheeler, David
Format:	Policy Research Working Paper
Language:	English en_US
Published:	World Bank, Washington, D.C. 2013
Subjects:	ABATEMENT ABATEMENT EFFORT AGRICULTURAL POLLUTION AIR EMISSIONS AIR MONITORING AIR POLLUTANTS AIR POLLUTION AIR PRESSURE AIR QUALITY AIR QUALITY MODELS CAPITAL STOCK CARBON CARBON DIOXIDE CARBON DIOXIDE EMISSIONS CLEAN AIR CLEAN TECHNOLOGY CLIMATE COMBUSTION COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGE DEVELOPING COUNTRIES DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS ECONOMIC ACTIVITY ELASTICITIES EMISSIONS EMPIRICAL RESEARCH EMPIRICAL STUDIES EMPIRICAL WORK ENVIRONMENTAL ECONOMICS ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS ENVIRONMENTAL KUZNETS ENVIRONMENTAL PERFORMANCE ENVIRONMENTAL PROBLEMS ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES EXPERIMENTS GASES GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING GREENHOUSE GASES HEALTH IMPACTS HUMAN HEALTH INCOME INCOME ELASTICITY INCOME INEQUALITY INCOME LEVELS INDUSTRIAL EMISSIONS INDUSTRIAL POLLUTION INDUSTRIAL POLLUTION PROJECTION SYSTEM IRON MARGINAL COST METALS MORBIDITY MORTALITY NATURAL RESOURCE DEGRADATION OXYGEN PARTICLES PARTICULATE MATTER
Online Access:	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2004/08/5103503/air-pollution-during-growth-accounting-governance-vulnerability http://hdl.handle.net/10986/14162

id	okr-10986-14162
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	okr-10986-141622021-04-23T14:03:21Z Air Pollution During Growth: Accounting for Governance and Vulnerability Dasgupta, Susmita Hamilton, Kirk Pandey, Kiran Wheeler, David ABATEMENT ABATEMENT EFFORT AGRICULTURAL POLLUTION AIR EMISSIONS AIR MONITORING AIR POLLUTANTS AIR POLLUTION AIR PRESSURE AIR QUALITY AIR QUALITY MODELS CAPITAL STOCK CARBON CARBON DIOXIDE CARBON DIOXIDE EMISSIONS CLEAN AIR CLEAN TECHNOLOGY CLIMATE COMBUSTION COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGE DEVELOPING COUNTRIES DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS ECONOMIC ACTIVITY ELASTICITIES EMISSIONS EMPIRICAL RESEARCH EMPIRICAL STUDIES EMPIRICAL WORK ENVIRONMENTAL ECONOMICS ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS ENVIRONMENTAL KUZNETS ENVIRONMENTAL PERFORMANCE ENVIRONMENTAL PROBLEMS ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES EXPERIMENTS GASES GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING GREENHOUSE GASES HEALTH IMPACTS HUMAN HEALTH INCOME INCOME ELASTICITY INCOME INEQUALITY INCOME LEVELS INDUSTRIAL EMISSIONS INDUSTRIAL POLLUTION INDUSTRIAL POLLUTION PROJECTION SYSTEM IRON MARGINAL COST METALS MORBIDITY MORTALITY NATURAL RESOURCE DEGRADATION OXYGEN PARTICLES PARTICULATE MATTER New research on urban air pollution casts doubt on the conventional view of the relationship between economic growth and environmental quality. This view holds that pollution automatically increases until societies reach middle-income status because poor countries have neither the institutional capacity nor the political commitment necessary to regulate polluters. Some policymakers and researchers have cited this model (called the "environmental Kuznets curve," or EKC) when arguing that developing countries should "grow first, clean up later." However, new evidence suggests that the EKC model is misleading because it mistakenly assumes that strong environmental governance is not possible for poor countries. As the authors show in this paper, the empirical relationship between pollution and income becomes much weaker when measures of governance are added to the analysis. Their results also suggest that previous research has underestimated the effect of geographic vulnerability (climate and terrain factors) on air quality. The authors find that weak governance and geographic vulnerability alone can account for the crisis levels of air pollution in many developing country cities. When these factors are combined with income and population effects, the authors have a sufficient explanation for the fact that some cities already have air quality comparable to levels in OECD urban areas. To summarize, their results suggest that the maxim "grow first, clean up later" is too simplistic. Appropriate urban growth strategies can steer development toward cities with lower geographic vulnerability, and governance reform can reduce air pollution significantly, long before countries reach middle-income status. 2013-06-25T14:07:56Z 2013-06-25T14:07:56Z 2004-08 http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2004/08/5103503/air-pollution-during-growth-accounting-governance-vulnerability http://hdl.handle.net/10986/14162 English en_US Policy Research Working Paper;No.3383 CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo/ World Bank World Bank, Washington, D.C. Publications & Research :: Policy Research Working Paper Publications & Research
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	Digital Repositories
building	World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection	World Bank
language	English en_US
topic	ABATEMENT ABATEMENT EFFORT AGRICULTURAL POLLUTION AIR EMISSIONS AIR MONITORING AIR POLLUTANTS AIR POLLUTION AIR PRESSURE AIR QUALITY AIR QUALITY MODELS CAPITAL STOCK CARBON CARBON DIOXIDE CARBON DIOXIDE EMISSIONS CLEAN AIR CLEAN TECHNOLOGY CLIMATE COMBUSTION COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGE DEVELOPING COUNTRIES DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS ECONOMIC ACTIVITY ELASTICITIES EMISSIONS EMPIRICAL RESEARCH EMPIRICAL STUDIES EMPIRICAL WORK ENVIRONMENTAL ECONOMICS ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS ENVIRONMENTAL KUZNETS ENVIRONMENTAL PERFORMANCE ENVIRONMENTAL PROBLEMS ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES EXPERIMENTS GASES GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING GREENHOUSE GASES HEALTH IMPACTS HUMAN HEALTH INCOME INCOME ELASTICITY INCOME INEQUALITY INCOME LEVELS INDUSTRIAL EMISSIONS INDUSTRIAL POLLUTION INDUSTRIAL POLLUTION PROJECTION SYSTEM IRON MARGINAL COST METALS MORBIDITY MORTALITY NATURAL RESOURCE DEGRADATION OXYGEN PARTICLES PARTICULATE MATTER
spellingShingle	ABATEMENT ABATEMENT EFFORT AGRICULTURAL POLLUTION AIR EMISSIONS AIR MONITORING AIR POLLUTANTS AIR POLLUTION AIR PRESSURE AIR QUALITY AIR QUALITY MODELS CAPITAL STOCK CARBON CARBON DIOXIDE CARBON DIOXIDE EMISSIONS CLEAN AIR CLEAN TECHNOLOGY CLIMATE COMBUSTION COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGE DEVELOPING COUNTRIES DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS ECONOMIC ACTIVITY ELASTICITIES EMISSIONS EMPIRICAL RESEARCH EMPIRICAL STUDIES EMPIRICAL WORK ENVIRONMENTAL ECONOMICS ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS ENVIRONMENTAL KUZNETS ENVIRONMENTAL PERFORMANCE ENVIRONMENTAL PROBLEMS ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES EXPERIMENTS GASES GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING GREENHOUSE GASES HEALTH IMPACTS HUMAN HEALTH INCOME INCOME ELASTICITY INCOME INEQUALITY INCOME LEVELS INDUSTRIAL EMISSIONS INDUSTRIAL POLLUTION INDUSTRIAL POLLUTION PROJECTION SYSTEM IRON MARGINAL COST METALS MORBIDITY MORTALITY NATURAL RESOURCE DEGRADATION OXYGEN PARTICLES PARTICULATE MATTER Dasgupta, Susmita Hamilton, Kirk Pandey, Kiran Wheeler, David Air Pollution During Growth: Accounting for Governance and Vulnerability
relation	Policy Research Working Paper;No.3383
description	New research on urban air pollution casts doubt on the conventional view of the relationship between economic growth and environmental quality. This view holds that pollution automatically increases until societies reach middle-income status because poor countries have neither the institutional capacity nor the political commitment necessary to regulate polluters. Some policymakers and researchers have cited this model (called the "environmental Kuznets curve," or EKC) when arguing that developing countries should "grow first, clean up later." However, new evidence suggests that the EKC model is misleading because it mistakenly assumes that strong environmental governance is not possible for poor countries. As the authors show in this paper, the empirical relationship between pollution and income becomes much weaker when measures of governance are added to the analysis. Their results also suggest that previous research has underestimated the effect of geographic vulnerability (climate and terrain factors) on air quality. The authors find that weak governance and geographic vulnerability alone can account for the crisis levels of air pollution in many developing country cities. When these factors are combined with income and population effects, the authors have a sufficient explanation for the fact that some cities already have air quality comparable to levels in OECD urban areas. To summarize, their results suggest that the maxim "grow first, clean up later" is too simplistic. Appropriate urban growth strategies can steer development toward cities with lower geographic vulnerability, and governance reform can reduce air pollution significantly, long before countries reach middle-income status.
format	Publications & Research :: Policy Research Working Paper
author	Dasgupta, Susmita Hamilton, Kirk Pandey, Kiran Wheeler, David
author_facet	Dasgupta, Susmita Hamilton, Kirk Pandey, Kiran Wheeler, David
author_sort	Dasgupta, Susmita
title	Air Pollution During Growth: Accounting for Governance and Vulnerability
title_short	Air Pollution During Growth: Accounting for Governance and Vulnerability
title_full	Air Pollution During Growth: Accounting for Governance and Vulnerability
title_fullStr	Air Pollution During Growth: Accounting for Governance and Vulnerability
title_full_unstemmed	Air Pollution During Growth: Accounting for Governance and Vulnerability
title_sort	air pollution during growth: accounting for governance and vulnerability
publisher	World Bank, Washington, D.C.
publishDate	2013
url	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2004/08/5103503/air-pollution-during-growth-accounting-governance-vulnerability http://hdl.handle.net/10986/14162
_version_	1764430668981338112

Air Pollution During Growth: Accounting for Governance and Vulnerability

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