Hello Prof and friends!

 

After reading about the occurrences of pollution in Singapore, do you think the circuit breaker really helped our environment? Was it truly a break for nature? Let’s uncover it right now!

 

We have seen how COVID-19 situation has improved air pollution level but exacerbated pollution in other aspects such as biohazardous and general waste. 

 

The improvement in air pollution was due to a slow down in activities by pollutant sources such as cars, refineries and air flights. The slow down was especially felt during the circuit breaker period. That said, we believe that the causal ‘benefit’ of COVID-19 with regard to pollution is extremely short-lived. Dr Koh Tieh Yong – an associate professor of atmospheric science at the Singapore University of Social Sciences – mentions that when the government eases COVID-19 measures, the air quality will return back to normal (Tan, 2020). The main sources of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) in Singapore are vehicular traffic and oil refining (Tan, 2020). While oil refining will emit decreased  NO2 (due to the reduction in global demand for petroleum products amidst an economic slowdown), vehicular traffic will go back to normal once people are able to travel around in Singapore post-circuit breaker. 

 

With businesses returning to pre-circuit breaker levels of activity, pollution may return to its original state or even worse since they are motivated by the need to recur economic losses. For example, more vehicles like trucks and lorries will be transporting goods for businesses and contributing to air pollution. Additionally, the government might focus more on recovering the economy instead of focusing on reducing environmental risks: choosing to paint their economy brown rather than green. Therefore, the improved air quality is highly transient, and is insufficient in off-setting the effects of COVID-19 in exacerbating pollution in general. COVID-19 can thus be seen as an overall bane in terms of pollution in Singapore.

 

With this post, we conclude our blog posts about how circuit breaker affected Singapore’s environment! Next, we will look at how other countries have been affected by similar measures, see you soon~

 

References

Tan, C. (2020). Coronavirus: Air quality improves as Singapore slows down under circuit breaker measures. [online] The Straits Times. Available at: https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/transport/coronavirus-air-quality-improves-as-singapore-slows-down-under-circuit-breaker [Accessed 6 Sep. 2020].