Did Covid-19 lockdown positively affect the urban environment and UN- Sustainable Development Goals?

Abstract

This work quantifies the impact of pre-, during- and post-lockdown periods of 2020 and 2019 imposed due to COVID-19, with regards to a set of satellite-based environmental parameters (greenness using Normalized Difference Vegetation and water indices, land surface temperature, night-time light, and energy consumption) in five alpha cities (Kuala Lumpur, Mexico, greater Mumbai, Sao Paulo, Toronto). We have inferenced our results with an extensive questionnaire-based survey of expert opinions about the environment-related UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Results showed considerable variation due to the lockdown on environment-related SDGs. The growth in the urban environmental variables during lockdown phase 2020 relative to a similar period in 2019 varied from 13.92% for Toronto to 13.76% for greater Mumbai to 21.55% for Kuala Lumpur; it dropped to -10.56% for Mexico and -1.23% for Sao Paulo city. The total lockdown was more effective in revitalizing the urban environment than partial lockdown. Our results also indicated that Greater Mumbai and Toronto, which were under a total lockdown, had observed positive influence on cumulative urban environment. While in other cities (Mexico City, Sao Paulo) where partial lockdown was implemented, cumulative lockdown effects were found to be in deficit for a similar period in 2019, mainly due to partial restrictions on transportation and shopping activities. The only exception was Kuala Lumpur which observed surplus growth while having partial lockdown because the restrictions were only partial during the festival of Ramadan. Cumulatively, COVID-19 lockdown has contributed significantly towards actions to reduce degradation of natural habitat (fulfilling SDG-15, target 15.5), increment in available water content in Sao Paulo urban area(SDG-6, target 6.6), reduction in NTL resulting in reducied per capita energy consumption (SDG-13, target 13.3).