Effects of neighborhood green space on PM2.5 mitigation: Evidence from five megacities in China

Abstract Airborne particulate matter (PM) has been a major threat to air quality and public health in major cities in China for more than a decade. Green space has been deemed to be effective in mitigating PM pollution; however, few studies have examined its effectiveness at the neighborhood scale. In this study, the authors probe the contributions from different landscape components in the green space (i.e., tree, grass), as well as the spatial scale of planning on fine PM (PM2.5) concentrations in urban neighborhoods. PM2.5 data including 37 samples from five megacities were collected from the National Environmental Monitoring Centre in China. Results showed that, neighborhood green space greatly contributed to the spatial variation in PM2.5. The total green space coverage, tree coverage, and grass coverage were all negatively correlated with PM2.5 concentration (p

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