This paper develops a globally comprehensive monetary assessment of damages from particulate matter air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions across 165 countries from 1998 to 2018. The study finds that pollution intensity initially decreased until the Great Recession, then reversed course, primarily due to increased economic production and pollution intensity in China and India. Monetizing pollution damages reveals that this adjustment significantly alters growth estimations, with higher growth before and lower growth after the recession. The research highlights that modeling monetary damages impacts sustainable development inferences, with particulate matter damages peaking earlier in development than CO2 damages, and both peaking later than their respective physical measures. The findings suggest rising future damages from both pollutants as nations grow.

Aniruddh Mohan, Nicholas Z. Muller, Akshay Thyagarajan, Randall V. Martin, Melanie S. Hammer, Aaron van Donkelaar