People working from home could contribute considerably to reducing pollution caused by harmful nitrogen dioxide.
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This is according to research conducted by scientists at the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology of the Universitat Autš°noma de Barcelona (ICTA-UAB). They looked at three different scenarios -- telecommuting two, three and four days a week. They based their findings on mobility and air quality data obtained in Barcelona during the COVID-19 lockdown.?
They found the harmful nitrous oxide levels to decline by four percent, eight percent and ten percent respectively. Moreover, if 40 percent of service sector employees worked from home for four days in a week, not only would NO2 levels decline by ten percent, traffic emissions would also drop by 15 percent.
Also, the length of trips that the remaining workers take to get their jobs would decline by 37.5 percent. In the other two scenarios -- two days work from home with 20 percent workforce and three days work from home for 30 percent of the workforce -- traffic emissions would drop by 5 percent and 10 percent respectively.?
The length of work-related travel would also drop by rates of 12.5 percent and 25 percent respectively.?
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Researchers also found that studying online would cut NO2 emissions by 20 percent and shopping online would cut it by 30 percent.?
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ICTA-UAB researcher and the study's lead author, Alba Badia, said in a statement, ¡°The application of this [third] scenario could be viable and realistic during periods of high pollution, as it is simply based on the maximization of teleworking and the reduction of other work-related travel and shopping.¡±
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