Spatial correlation between Air quality and Manufacturing agglomeration- across Indian States

The paper examines the spatial association between concentration of manufacturing sector and air quality across Indian states using a spatial autoregressive modelling technique. While empirically modelling the impact of agglomeration of manufacturing sector on the level of concentration of air pollutants, it was observed that the overall agglomeration of manufacturing sector (both the organized and unorganized sector) significantly aggravates the level of concentration of SO2 in the air across Indian states, after controlling for other state-level characteristics including the environmental stringency of each state. The level of concentration of pollutants in the air within a particular state is also observed to have an impact on the level of the concentration of pollutants of the adjacent states. The results establish the fact that the consideration of the degree of agglomeration of the manufacturing industries and the ambient concentration of air pollutants should be considered simultaneously while allowing the establishment of a new plant in a particular region within the country