By Martina Amelia
Every dollar invested in tackling climate change and air pollution together can generate around US$15 in economic benefits, this is higher than tackling them separately and includes both market and non-market economic gains.
This is according to a report titled ‘Hidden Assets: The Economic and Health Case for Climate and Clean Air Action’ by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Climate and Clean Air Coalition (CCAC).
Released to coincide with the International Day of Clean Air for Blue Skies, it’s billed as the first comprehensive global economic assessment to model the two crises as a single, intertwined problem rather than two separate line items competing for the same budget.
“For too long, we have treated climate action as a cost to be managed and air pollution as the unfortunate outcome of development. This report shows the opposite: clean air is a key driver of development, health, food and energy security, and climate stability – an asset we must invest in,” said Inger Andersen, Executive Director of UNEP.
“Proven solutions already exist. What we lack is the decisive leadership from governments, financial institutions, and businesses to deliver them with the speed and coordination this crisis demands.”
The report recommends 25 measures which if implemented would yield greater results. They include renewable power and energy efficiency, increasing clean cooking and heating solutions, tighter vehicle emission and efficiency standards as well as inspection and maintenance.
Others are electric vehicles and low-sulfur shipping fuels, recovery of associated gas to end routine venting and flaring and reduce oil and gas leaks, livestock and manure management, more efficient fertilizer use, improved rice cultivation and alternatives to crop residue burning, better solid waste and wastewater management, and phasing down HFCs.
By 2050, full implementation of the 25 measures could cumulatively prevent 144 million air pollution related premature deaths, including 96 million from ambient air pollution alone, and hundreds of millions of cases of chronic disease.
Additionally, the annual economic payoff would climb from 2.8% of global GDP in 2035 to 4.5% by 2050, and eventually to 11.4% by century’s end a figure that dwarfs what the world currently spends on fossil fuel subsidies or even healthcare.
“A benefit-cost ratio of 15 to 1 would attract capital instantly in almost any other sector. The only reason it hasn’t on integrated climate and clean air action yet is that the returns are split across health systems, productivity and avoided climate damage rather than landing on a single balance sheet,” said Elliott Harris, independent, co-chair of the Assessment.
“Every year of delay costs the world more than USD1.5 trillion in benefits we will not get back. Finance ministries and investors who keep climate and air quality in separate budget lines are leaving trillions on the table.”
Full implementation of the measures would roughly halve global carbon dioxide emissions by 2050, cut methane emissions by 60%, and slash black carbon, sulphur dioxide, and nitrogen oxides by around 70%, together avoiding an estimated 0.34°C of warming by mid-century and 1.4°C by 2100.
Notably, the report doesn’t frame the obstacle as a lack of proven solutions. The bottleneck, it argues, is institutional: fragmented decision making, weak enforcement, and poor coordination between the agencies that handle climate policy and those that handle public health and air quality. Left unaddressed, these barriers could delay full implementation by nearly eight years globally closing that gap, the report estimates, could unlock up to $10 trillion in additional health benefits by 2040
The report lands at a fraught moment for climate diplomacy. A separate UNEP assessment issued earlier this year warned that global average temperatures are now expected to exceed the 1.5°C threshold set out in the Paris Agreement, with even the most optimistic projections putting peak warming near 1.8°C.
Meanwhile, the World Meteorological Organization has flagged that worsening wildfires and heatwaves are actively eroding the air-quality gains many countries had been making, adding urgency to the case for treating clean air and climate policy as a single agenda rather than two competing ones.
