Seasonal impacts of buildings' energy consumption on the variation and spatial distribution of air pollutant over Kabul City: application of Sentinel-5P TROPOMI products

Air and environmental pollution are influenced by natural and anthropogenic activities. In addition, seasonal variations also affect the level of air pollutant concentration. Air pollution has a negative impact on climate, human-being health, and the environment. Monitoring of air pollution is a critical challenge in the world for better planning regarding its reduction. This study aims to monitor the impacts of seasonal diversity of buildings' energy consumption pattern on the tropospheric NO2, CO, and SO2 concentrations over the 22 districts of Kabul City. Sentinel-5P TROPOMI data was used for the space measurement of the selected tropospheric pollutant during the winter (December 2019, January, and February 2020) and summer (June, July, and August 2020) seasons. Google Earth Engine platform was used for the processing and analysis of data, and ArcGIS 10.7.1 was utilized for the plotting of thematic maps. This study's findings demonstrate that the tropospheric NO2, CO, and SO2 concentrations were reduced from the winter to the summer season. The main sources of NO2, CO, and SO2 pollutants are coal, wood, gas, and biomass burning, since these substances are consumed for heating purposes due to the cold weather during the winter season. Consequently, the results were validated using real-time data to test reliability. There was a high correlation between the output of this study and validation data.