The Effect of Social and Economic Development on Air Pollution in Indian Cities

Type Working Paper - Environment and Urbanization Asia
Title The Effect of Social and Economic Development on Air Pollution in Indian Cities
Author(s)
Volume 5
Issue 1
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2014
Page numbers 1-15
URL http://eua.sagepub.com/content/5/1/1.short
Abstract
This article presents new estimates of air pollution production functions using data from Indian cities. The resulting estimates enable tests of various hypotheses concerning the effect of income, literacy, population and other variables on four measures of air pollution: sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and two measures of particulate matter. Controlling for multiple factors, we find the relationship between social and economic development and pollution varies across pollution types and development indicators; we find a negative relationship between income and particulate matter, no relationship between income and sulfur dioxide emissions and a positive relationship between income and nitrogen dioxide emissions. We also test for non-linear relationships, but do not find strong non-monotonic relationships between income and pollution, though there is some evidence for non-monotonic relationships between literacy and pollution. We present new population elasticity estimates and document large variation in air pollution levels across regions and industries.

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