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<p>The United Nations specifies the need for improving air quality to reduce adverse per capita environmental impacts of cities in Sustainable Development Goal 11. Within this framework, urban trees are widely promoted as a critical intervention for supporting global clean air policies. However, the extent to which they affect air pollution and the associated health burden remains unclear. Here, we quantify the effects of urban trees on PM<sub>2.5</sub> concentrations across 125 countries using a generalized linear mixed-effects model and estimate the resulting premature deaths. We find that the impacts of urban trees exhibit strong geographical disparities, reducing annual PM<sub>2.5</sub> concentrations in some countries while exacerbating them in others. Specifically, urban trees mitigate annual PM<sub>2.5</sub> concentrations by an average of 0.14 µg/m³ in 64% of the analyzed countries, while exacerbating concentrations by an average of 0.13 µg/m³ in the remaining countries. Consequently, urban trees are estimated to prevent approximately 2191 premature deaths annually, while also contributing to 207 additional deaths. These impacts underscore a notable dual effect, indicating that benefits and risks associated with urban trees lack consistent performance across different contexts. Our findings highlight that although urban greening remains a broadly positive strategy for improving air quality and public health, its double-edged effect suggests it should complement, rather than serve as the central strategy for air pollution control.</p>

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Dual effect of global urban trees on PM2.5 and associated health burden

  • 期刊论文

  • 出版模式：

    开放获取

  • 发表日期：

    2026年6月3日

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  • Hui Sun,
  • Yuchun Ni,
  • Fanhua Kong,
  • Lu Liang,
  • Roy M. Harrison,
  • Jeffrey Brook,
  • Zhenyu Gai,
  • Jie Su,
  • Zhou Shen,
  • Haiwei Yin

摘要

The United Nations specifies the need for improving air quality to reduce adverse per capita environmental impacts of cities in Sustainable Development Goal 11. Within this framework, urban trees are widely promoted as a critical intervention for supporting global clean air policies. However, the extent to which they affect air pollution and the associated health burden remains unclear. Here, we quantify the effects of urban trees on PM2.5 concentrations across 125 countries using a generalized linear mixed-effects model and estimate the resulting premature deaths. We find that the impacts of urban trees exhibit strong geographical disparities, reducing annual PM2.5 concentrations in some countries while exacerbating them in others. Specifically, urban trees mitigate annual PM2.5 concentrations by an average of 0.14 µg/m³ in 64% of the analyzed countries, while exacerbating concentrations by an average of 0.13 µg/m³ in the remaining countries. Consequently, urban trees are estimated to prevent approximately 2191 premature deaths annually, while also contributing to 207 additional deaths. These impacts underscore a notable dual effect, indicating that benefits and risks associated with urban trees lack consistent performance across different contexts. Our findings highlight that although urban greening remains a broadly positive strategy for improving air quality and public health, its double-edged effect suggests it should complement, rather than serve as the central strategy for air pollution control.