Effect of COVID-19 on Traffic Pollutants – Comparison of Before and After Lockdown in the Urban Counties

Abstract

The environment has been impacted both positively and negatively by the change in human behavior in daily activities, including travel during the Covid-19 lockdown. The goal of this study is to assess the effects of air pollution concentrations connected to transportation, such as NO2, CO, O3, and PM 2.5, that are influenced by the daily number of trips. When compared to before the lockdown period, it was discovered that the trips had significantly decreased once the lockdown was announced. Five urban counties in the South, West, East, North East, and South East of the American continent were the subjects of the study. According to earlier research, meteorological factors have an impact on air pollution concentrations. As a result, this study also sought to determine whether there was a relationship between pollution levels and weather variables such as daily average temperature and daily average wind speed at the air quality monitoring station locations for the study area. The study found an overall drop in all pollutants, with the exception of an increase/decrease in ground-level Ozone levels in a few counties. The fluctuation in Ozone levels was justified with respect to the location, weather conditions, and an increase in household activities during the lockdown. For all the counties, there was a consistent relationship between the pollutants NO2 and CO and the number of trips, the temperature, and the wind speed. However, the impact of PM 2.5 in Dallas County exhibited a negative connection with trips, indicating that other sources of pollution that predominated during the lockdown are affecting the pollution in Dallas.