Vehicle Emission Changes in China under Different Control Measures over Past Two Decades

Vehicle emissions have become a significant source of air pollution in urban cities, especially in China. Mobile sources account for 45% of local fine particle emissions in the Chinese capital Beijing. The Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei (BTH) area, one of China’s most representative urban clusters, is suffering from severe air pollution. With the rapid growth of vehicle ownership in the past two decades, vehicle emissions in China have also undergone great changes under various management measures. The BTH region is also a place where mobile source emission management was carried out earlier. It is of important research value to understand the evolution trend of the vehicle ownerships in the BTH region and the actual effects of various management measures for the control of vehicle emissions. Due to the imperfect evaluation of the current vehicle emission limitation measures from 2000 to 2019, the vehicle emission inventory of the BTH region was established, and the major control measures in the BTH region were evaluated. Results showed that the vehicle ownership has been increasing year by year over the past 20 years, from 2.39 million in 2000 to 25.32 million in 2019, with an average annual growth rate of 13.24%. However, the pollutants discharged by motor vehicles showed a trend of first rising and then falling due to various measures except CO2. The unsynchronized control measures have resulted in huge differences in vehicle growth trends and emissions among Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei. The emissions of carbon monoxide (CO), volatile organic compounds (VOCs), nitrogen oxides (NOX), and particulate matter (PM10) in Beijing showed a trend of increasing first and then decreasing. The changes in these pollutants in Tianjin were similar to those in Beijing, but there was a secondary increase for NOX and PM10 in the later period. The discharge of all pollutants in Hebei Province showed a growing trend except sulfur dioxide (SO2). The major emission source of CO and VOCs in BTH was PCs, and the contribution rate of PCs to VOCs, reached 86.0–89.6% in 2019. Heavy-duty trucks (HDTs) and buses were the main sources of NOX emissions, contributing 78.2–85.4% of NOX in 2019. Eliminating high emission vehicles was the best control measure in the BTH Region, which had a good emission reduction effect on all pollutants. For sustainable development of the BTH region, it is suggested that Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei province implement vehicle control policies simultaneously and establish a joint management mechanism.