Air Pollution and Population in Kuwait - Research Paper Example

Air Pollution and Population in Kuwait Introduction: The topic that is being discussed statistically in this paper is ‘Air pollution and population in Kuwait.’ Air pollution and population are two very interrelated topics of study. In the present days where climate control is an important topic of study, it is important to study the topic of air pollution, which is in a way directly related to climate control. Similarly, pollution and population are interconnected as population study is a reliable replica of the amount of pollution in a country. Here, the study is being undertaken in Kuwait as the middle-east countries are developing countries and Kuwait is one of the important countries in the Middle East. The nature and objective of the study is to find the relationship between air pollution and population in Kuwait A simple linear model to establish a relationship between the two variables is Yt = b1 + b2 * Xt Where: Yt is air pollution Xt is population. An increase or decrease in air pollution is an effect of change in population combined with several other factors. There are several hypotheses to be tested and several policies to be evaluated, which are dependent on a number of questions. The issues to be considered in this paper are as follows: 1. How strong is the relationship between air pollution and population? 2. How strong is the relationship between air pollution and population in Kuwait? 3. Can pollution be treated as an independent variable apart from population? 4. What are the effects of air pollution on the population in Kuwait? 5. What is the effect of air pollution on the life span of the population in Kuwait? 6. How does air pollution affect the life expectancy of the Kuwaiti population? 7. Which age groups are most affected by air pollution in Kuwait? 8. Is air pollution only due to outdoor factors or are there any indoor factors also involved? 9. Which gas (causal of air pollution) is the most harmful to the population? 10. What are the atmospheric levels of pollution in terms of nitrogen oxide and dioxide, carbon monoxide and dioxide and ozone in Kuwait? “Population growth, industrialization and socio economic development all contribute to air pollution” (Cramer 1). The issues that are being studied here are of global importance and therefore this study needs to be undertaken with utmost concentration in order to achieve the desired results. 2. Literature Review: Literature review on this topic provides the importance of the subject topic. Air pollution and population both has an effect on each other. Air pollution has significant effects on the population, especially on the health of the population. Similarly, the growth in air pollution can also be a result of an increase in population. Kuwait is one of the most famous middle-east countries and crude oil is the major energy source in the country. Emissions like carbon monoxide (CO), carbon dioxide (CO2), sulphur dioxide (SO2), methane and other hydro carbons are the major causes of air pollution in the country. “Man-made urban air pollution is a complex mixture with many toxic components” (Cohen et al. 1353). According to the ‘World Bank data’ reported in 2010, the population of Kuwait was 2,736,732. The report also stated that the forest area in Kuwait comprised of only 31.1 % of the land area. The carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in 2008 were 4.8 metric tons per capita. The report shows that the forest cover in Kuwait has shown a decreasing trend over the past years, while the CO2 and methane emissions have shown an increasing trend. ‘The Journal of environmental protection’ in 2011 released a study conducted on the correlation of the disease asthma in humans which goes in hand with an increase in the NO2 in Kuwait. This study lays stress on the increase of NO2 in the atmosphere, mainly indoors. The report states that Kuwait’s buildings come under the effect of the harsh weather conditions prevalent in Kuwait. Air pollution is not just concerned with the outside air, which is a result of harmful air released from factories, vehicles etc. but air pollution is also concerned with the indoor air quality. “Motor vehicles are a critical source of urban air pollution (PM10, CO, CO2, NOx, O3, SO2 and VOCs)” (Al-Bassam & Khan para. 5). It is very important to measure indoor air quality. Indoor air quality is particularly increased due to the concentration of nitrogen dioxide in the atmosphere. Indoor air pollutants are mainly fuel burning appliances such as gas stoves, furnaces, heaters, fireplaces etc. According to a report released in 2010 called the ‘Environmental Performance Index’, the impact of air pollution on human in Kuwait is 55.7%, while the impact of air pollution on the eco system is 33.4%. The report also indicated that among the total percentage of air pollution, 94.7% is indoor air pollution while the rest is outdoor air pollution. The data report also states that Ozone is also one of the important factors of air pollution. Air pollution has severe short as well as long term consequences on the health of the people. The short term health consequences are pulmonary and cardio vascular diseases, while long term health consequences are chronic pulmonary diseases and cardio vascular diseases. Allergy is another very important disease, which cannot be classified as short term or long term and is caused due to the increase of carbon content in the atmosphere. The ISCST3 model (industrial source complex short term model) was used in order to find out the model emissions from “five basic sources which included point, volume, area line and open pit resources” (Alhaddad et al. 62). In the article ‘Primary pollutants monitoring and modeling using chemical mass balance around Fahaheel residential area’ by ‘S.M. Al- Salem, A.A. Al-Haddad, A.R. Khan stated that the industrial sector of Kuwait contributes “about 29% to the total greenhouse emissions divided between industrial processes and energy requirements at 12 and 17% respectively” (Al-Salem et al. para. 4). Air pollution in Kuwait is associated with a number of diseases like asthma, cancer and a large variety of irritations and infections. Kuwait has seen a large increase in air pollution related diseases with the increase of industrialization. In the article ‘Analysis of air pollution at Shuaiba industrial area in Kuwait’, the authors Sabah Abdul Wahab, Walid Bouhamra, Hisham Ettouney have stated that the main source of air pollution in Kuwait is the industries. In this study the authors studied the pollutant behavior of various pollutants in order to understand the amount of air pollution in Kuwait. The study involved several large scale industries, which also included power plants, refineries, fertilizer plants and commercial harbors. Their report stated that there was monthly and seasonal variation in the gas emissions being made from several industries. “The monthly variations of SO2 and NO x showed maximum values during the warm months” (Abdul-Wahab et al. para. 1). It is quite true because it is very difficult to record the monthly variations in gas emissions like (CO), (CO2), SO2, NO x and methane and other hydro carbons. Gas emissions are very difficult to record specially the monthly and yearly variations. In an article ‘The health benefits of interventions to reduce indoor air pollution from solid fuel use: a cost effectiveness analyses’ the authors Sumi Mehta and Cyrus Shahpar are of the viewpoint that air pollution causes many diseases to the population. The article also states that air pollution is not always outdoor pollution, but it is also indoor pollution. Indoor air pollution is caused due to factors like cooking and heating. The literature review discussed above provides information about both air pollution and population in Kuwait. To analyze the relationship between these two variables further statistical analysis is needed. 3. Data 3.1 Data Description: Since the data should not be older than 6 years, therefore for the purpose of this project we had obtained the data from 2007 till 2010. The population and the pollution details have been obtained for only four years. The data provided is reliable, short and comprehensive. “Even though the air pollution and socio-economic variables have widely ranging spatial patterns, there is no strong correlation between the air pollution and socio-economic patterns” (Anderson et al. para. 1). Statistical analysis is being done with respect to the data obtained for four years. The data table is being given below: Data Table: year Population Population growth rate carbon Nitrogen 2007 2505559 3.560 .02 .20 2008 2596799 3.590 .04 .37 2009 2691158 3.550 .07 .53 2010 2789132 3.5 0.1 0.65 Specification of the Model: We use Multiple Linear Regression for analyzing this data. Linear Regression is an approach to modeling the relationship between a dependent variable Y and one or more independent variables X. In case of one independent variable we call it as Simple Regression. If more than one independent variable is present then it is called Multiple Regression. As we are testing for linear relationship, we are able to work out the linear model that is the best fit of the data, called multiple regressions. Using linear functions, we can model the data in linear regression and unknown model parameters are estimated from the data. Such models are called linear model. The multiple linear Regression model is, Y=b0+ b1x1 +b2x2+ ...+e Where Y is the dependent or scalar variable, x1,x2, x3 etc are the independent or explanatory variables, b0 is the intercept term, and b1,b2 etc are the coefficient of the independent variables. The multiple regressions can be employed with more than one explanatory variable as a predictor of the dependent variable, and also we can examine the contribution of each independent variable to the prediction. In our problem, we take population growth as the dependent variable and air pollution as the independent variables. Here we want to test the null hypothesis H0 = When population growth rate increases then air pollution also increases. Vs Alternative Hypothesis H1=When population growth rate increases then air pollution decreases. 4. Results: anova Model Sum of Squares df Mean Square F Sig. 1 Regression .004 2 .002 35.727 .117a Residual .000 1 .000 Total .004 3 a. Predictors: (Constant), nitrogen content, carbon content Coefficientsa Model Unstandardized Coefficients Standardized Coefficients t Sig. 95.0% Confidence Interval for B B Std. Error Beta Lower Bound Upper Bound 1 (Constant) 3.517 .019 184.263 .003 3.274 3.759 carbon content -4.697 .801 -4.394 -5.863 .108 -14.878 5.483 nitrogen content .694 .143 3.624 4.836 .130 -1.129 2.516 a. Dependent Variable: Population Growth Rate: The descriptive statistics table is given to us to observe the variations in the contents. The mean for each variable are displayed and the standard deviation is also displayed in the Descriptive Statistics table and N represents the number of years. From the Correlation table we can get an idea of the variables that show a significant correlation. The multiple correlation coefficients R give us a value of the strength of the relationship. The R value (.993a) indicates the multiple correlation coefficients between all the entered independent variables and the dependent variables. The adjusted R- square adjusts for a bias in R2 as the number of variables increases. With only a few predictor variables, the adjusted r-square (.959) should be similar to the R2 (.986) value, when you have a lot of variables. The standard error of an estimate (.007614) is a measure of the variability of a multiple correlation. The regression coefficients are the following: b0 ^= 3.517 b1 ^= -4.697 b2 ^= .694 Therefore the fitted model is, Y = 3.517 +(-4.697)x1 + .694x2 Standard error of the regression estimates are given by SE (b0 ^ ) = 0.019 Standard error of the regression estimates are given by SE (b1 ^ ) = 0.801 Standard error of the regression estimates are given by SE (b2 ^ ) = 0.143 Here the coefficient of determination R2 is 0.986 The 95% confidence interval is given by, b1= (3.274, 3.759) b2= (-14.878, 5.483) b3= (-1.129, 2.516) Here P (= 0.003) < .05 therefore we reject the null hypothesis. Here P (= 0.108) > .05 therefore we accept the null hypothesis Here P (= 0.130) > .05 therefore we accept the null hypothesis Hence we can conclude that as our population growth increases, air pollution is also increases 5. Conclusion: From the statistical analysis above it is proved that in Kuwait an increase in the population growth increases the air pollution in the country, as rise in population is accompanied by rise in industrialization and this increases the air pollution in the country. An increase in population increases the air pollution in the country which is proved through the null and alternative hypothesis. Work Cited Abdul-Wahab et al. Analysis of Air Pollution at Shuaiba Industrial Area in Kuwait. Taylor & Francis Online. 2000. Web. 22, Dec. 2011. Al-Bassam, E. & Khan, A. Air Pollution and Road Traffic in Kuwait. Transactions of the Wessex institute. 2011. Web. 22, Dec. 2011. Alhaddad et al. Emmission Rate Model and Predictions of Air Pollution in Kuwait. Chemical Engineering Department. Kuwait University. n.d. Web. 22, Dec. 2011. < http://www.wseas.us/e-library/conferences/2011/Angers/ELA/ELA-08.pdf> Al-Salem et al. Primary Pollutants Monitoring and Modeling Using Chemical Mass Balance around Fahaheel Residential Area. Business Library. 2008. Web. 22, Dec. 2011. < http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_6960/is_1_4/ai_n28454279/> Anderson et al. Correlation between Air Pollution and Socio-Economic Factors in Los Angeles Country. Science Direct. 1978. Web. 22, Dec. 2011. Cohen et al. Chapter 17: Urban Air Pollution. Comparative Quantification of Health Risks. n.d. Web. 22, Dec. 2011. Cramer, James C. Population Growth and Local Air Pollution: Methods, Models, and Results. Population and Development Review: Population Council. 2002. Web. 22, Dec. 2011. < http://www.jstor.org/pss/3115267> Read More