The Dimming of Lights in India during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

The monthly Suomi National Polar-orbiting (NPP) Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) Day–Night Band (DNB) composite reveals the dimming of lights as an effect of the lockdown enforced by the government of India in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The changes in lighting are examined by creating difference maps of a pre-pandemic pair and comparing it with two pandemic pairs. The visual raster difference maps are substantiated with quantitative analysis showing the proportion of population affected by the changes in the lighting brightness levels. In the pre-pandemic images of February and March 2019, 60% of the population lived in administrative units that became brighter in March 2019. However, in the first pandemic pair, 87% of the population lived in administrative units that became dimmer in March 2020 after the lockdown in comparison to February 2020. The nightly DNB profile at the airport in Delhi illustrate how the dimming of lights coincide with the date of the onset of the lockdown (in March 2020). The study shows the usefulness of the DNB nightly and monthly composites in examining economic impacts of the pandemic as countries throughout the world go through economic declines and move towards recovery.

Effects of the COVID-19 Lockdown on Urban Light Emissions: Ground and Satellite Comparison

“…This illustrates the important role of the angle of observations in these measurements. Some other research has not consider this potential issue (Liu et al, 2020;Elvidge et al, 2020;Ghosh et al, 2020).…”

Lockdown induced night-time light dynamics during the COVID-19 epidemic in global megacities

“… Elvidge et al (2020) found that 82% of the population lived in administrative units where lighting dimmed because of the lockdown of cities in China. A similar study in India reported that 87% of the population lived in administrative units that became dimmer after the lockdown compared to one month before ( Ghosh et al, 2020 ). In Africa, 75% of the natural protected areas (tourism economic zones) experienced a decline in light intensity ( Anand and Kim, 2021 ).…”

Pandemic Induced Changes in Economic Activity around African Protected Areas Captured through Night-Time Light Data

“…In this scenario, remote sensing approaches can be a useful first step to assess the extent of change induced by this pandemic. Few studies recently have used remote sensing data to demonstrate the impact of the pandemic on economic activities and the environment [16][17][18].…”

“…Using night-time light data as a proxy indicator, studies have estimated economic activities on global, national, and subnational levels in developing economies [22][23][24], the spatial distribution of GDP [20,25], and mapped urbanization dynamics [24,26,27]. Recent studies in China [17,28], Germany [29] and India [18] have shown how nighttime lights can be used as a proxy to monitor change and recovery in economic activity levels due to lockdown imposed by the pandemic. Studies have shown that night-time lights do provide a reliable indicator to capture economic activity.…”