Impact of China’s Economic Development on Levels of PM2.5 Value in the Air

IB Environmental Systems and Societies
IA Task
World Count: 2217
IB Number: md847 (050621 0020)
Student’s Name: Shiyi Yu
Research Question
What impact does China’s economic development have on levels of PM2.5 value in the air at the beginning stage of its economic development?
Hypothesis:
If economic development is fast, the PM2.5 value in the air will increase due to all the industrial discharge produced by factories, vehicles, and so on.
Air pollution is a common environmental health hazard. Often, when brown haze takes the atmosphere of a city or vehicles in busy highways exhaust billows, the idea of pollution arises. Still, some pollution is not seen, however, its pungent smell is an alarm. In essence, air pollution it’s the toxic mix of dangerous substances both from human-made as well as natural resources. Notably, emissions emerge from vehicle emissions, fossil fuels, by-products of power generation and manufacturing such as coal-fueled power plants, and chemical production. Likewise, nature releases poisonous substances into the air, such as smoke from wildfire or ash from volcanic eruptions. Gases like methane that originate from decomposing organic material also contribute to pollution. These fine particles from pollution have names. And one example is PM2.5. PM stands for particulate matter (also called particle pollution): the term for a mixture of solid particles and liquid droplets found in the air. PM2.5 refers to the fine particles that have diameters of 2.5 micrometers or smaller (EPA, 2020). PM 2.5 is especially harmful to human body since it go directly into deep lung and causes damage due to its size (Xing,Y., Xu, Y., Shi, M., & Lian, X., 2016).
China has an economy that experienced the fastest growth in the past three decades. Its gross domestic product (GDP) grew from less than $400 billion in 1990 to more than 6 trillion US dollars in 2010, one of the fastest economic growths compared to the rest of other countries in the same period of time. Due to the rapid economic growth, China burned a lot of coal, built several factories, and produced many vehicles. As a result, industrial and population growth contributed to the amount of environmental and air pollution.
Notably, energy consumption and production in China and production are the leading contributors of pollution. Beginning 2003, China ranked second as the largest energy consumer after the United States (Crompton & Wu, 2004). This was likely because of the nation’s tremendous economic growth due to its economic reforms beginning 1970s that subsequently raised its GDP. In the early 1990s, only 1% of the air quality in 500 Chinese cities were polluted. Beginning the new millennium, nearly 75% of air quality was polluted.
It is important to define the relation between economic development and air pollution in China because it will underscore the role of economic development in air pollution. Whenever nations industrialize and focus on the manufacturing sector, levels of air pollution rise at unprecedented rates. PM 2.5 causes damage not only to human beings but also to animals in the environment. Diseases caused by fine dust include bronchial asthma, lung cancer, cardio cerebral vascular diseases, a...