Societal shifts due to COVID-19 reveal large-scale complexities and feedbacks between atmospheric chemistry and climate change
Joshua L. Laughner, Jessica L. Neu, David Schimel, P. O. Wennberg, Kelley C. Barsanti, K. W. Bowman, Abhishek Chatterjee, Bart E. Croes, Helen L. Fitzmaurice, Daven K. Henze, Jinsol Kim, E. A. Kort, Zhu Liu, Kazuyuki Miyazaki, Alexander J. Turner, Susan C. Anenberg, J. Avise, Hansen Cao, David Crisp, J. A. de Gouw, A. Eldering, John C. Fyfe, Daniel L. Goldberg, K. R. Gurney, Sina Hasheminassab, F. M. Hopkins, Cesunica E. Ivey, Dylan B. A. Jones, Junjie Liu, Nicole S. Lovenduski, Randall V. Martin, Galen A. McKinley, Lesley Ott, Benjamin Poulter, Muye Ru, Stanley P. Sander, Neil C. Swart, Yuk L. Yung, Zhao‐Cheng Zeng
Abstract
Significance The COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdowns caused significant changes to human activity that temporarily altered our imprint on the atmosphere, providing a brief glimpse of potential future changes in atmospheric composition. This event demonstrated key feedbacks within and between air quality and the carbon cycle: Improvements in air quality increased the lifetime of methane (an important greenhouse gas), while unusually hot weather and intense wildfires in Los Angeles drove poor air quality. This shows that efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve air quality cannot be considered separately.