Molecular Energy
Pollution at schools and children's aerobic capacity
Michelle Marcus
Health Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
Poor respiratory health is a major cause of mortality and morbidity worldwide, and children are especially vulnerable. Existing research in economics has documented the effect of pollution on severe health outcomes, such as hospitalizations for asthma and infant death. However, evidence on the effect of air pollution on less extreme measures of respiratory health is limited, because these effects are difficult to measure. Using a more sensitive measure, aerobic capacity (VO2 max), I study the impact of air pollution on respiratory performance of children. I combine school-grade level data from the California Physical Fitness Test from 2009 to 2017 with local air pollution and weather data to estimate the impact on student aerobic capacity of fluctuations in air pollution levels on testing days. Ozone affects child aerobic capacity at levels even below the Environmental Protection Agency thresholds.
The value of car ownership and use in the United States
Joanna Moody et al.
Nature Sustainability, September 2021, Pages 769–774
Abstract:
It is widely accepted that consumers underestimate the full cost of car ownership and that correcting this bias could meaningfully accelerate the adoption of shared mobility. Yet this argument fails to consider how much benefit consumers enjoy from owning their own vehicle. Here we estimate the value of private car ownership and use in four US metro areas -- Chicago, Illinois; Dallas, Texas; Seattle, Washington; and Washington DC -- using online discrete choice experiments. We find that, on average, people would need to be paid $11,197 to give up access to their privately owned vehicle for one year, which is at least as much as estimates of the average total private cost of vehicle ownership (~$9,000). Critically, we find that more than half of this value is non-use value -- such as the option to travel whenever or wherever needed at a moment’s notice and the status that comes from owning one’s own vehicle -- beyond the use value of getting from A to B. Further, this non-use value was found to be much higher during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our findings reframe the conversation around the transition away from private vehicle dependence, emphasizing the need to provide value and convenience if alternative mobility solutions are to be widely adopted.
The Psychosocial Effects of the Flint Water Crisis on School-Age Children
Sam Trejo, Gloria Yeomans-Maldonado & Brian Jacob
NBER Working Paper, October 2021
Abstract:
Lead poisoning has well-known impacts for the developing brain of young children, with a large literature documenting the negative effects of elevated blood lead levels on academic and behavioral outcomes. In April of 2014, the municipal water source in Flint, Michigan was changed, causing lead from aging pipes to leach into the city’s drinking water. In this study, we use Michigan’s universe of longitudinal, student-level education records, combined with home water service line inspection data containing the location of lead pipes, to empirically examine the effect of the Flint Water Crisis on educational outcomes of Flint public school children. We leverage parallel causal identification strategies, a between-district synthetic control analysis and a within-Flint difference-in-differences analysis, to separate out the direct health effects of lead exposure from the broad effects of living in a community experiencing a crisis. Our results highlight a less well-appreciated consequence of the Flint Water Crisis – namely, the psychosocial effects of the crisis on the educational outcomes of school-age children. These findings suggest that cost estimates which rely only on the negative impact of direct lead exposure substantially underestimate the overall societal cost of the crisis.
Downwind and Out: The Strategic Dispersion of Power Plants and their Pollution
John Morehouse & Edward Rubin
University of Oregon Working Paper, April 2021
Abstract:
US environmental policy cedes substantial authority to local agencies -- creating potentials for polluters/governments to strategically export emissions. We identify such strategies among coal-fueled power plants. First, we document that electricity generators locate near administrative borders. As water influences borders/siting, we develop a simple, nonparametric test that shows coal plants located to reduce downwind exposure. Natural-gas plants -- facing lower regulatory pressure -- do not exhibit this behavior. Using a state-of-the-art, particle-trajectory model, we illustrate coal pollution’s extreme mobility: within 6 hours, 50% of coal plants’ emissions leave their source states -- 99% depart source counties. These strategic responses emphasize the importance of federal oversight and transport-focused regulation.
Long-term effect of exposure to lower concentrations of air pollution on mortality among US Medicare participants and vulnerable subgroups: A doubly-robust approach
Mahdieh Danesh Yazdi et al.
Lancet Planetary Health, October 2021, Pages e689-e697
Methods:
Our nationwide cohort study investigated the effect of annual average exposure to air pollutants on all-cause mortality among Medicare enrolees from the beginning of 2000 to the end of 2016. Patients entered the cohort in the month of January following enrolment and were followed up until the end of the study period in 2016 or death. We restricted our analyses to participants who had only been exposed to lower concentrations of pollutants over the study period, specifically particulate matter less than 2.5 μg/m3 in diameter (PM2.5) at a concentration of up to 12 μg/m3, nitrogen dioxide (NO2) at a concentration of up to 53 parts per billion (ppb), and summer ozone (O3) at concentrations of up to 50 ppb. We adjusted for two types of covariates, which were individual level and postal code-level variables. We used a doubly-robust additive model to estimate the change in risk. We further looked at effect-measure modification by stratification on the basis of demographic and socioeconomic characteristics.
Findings:
We found an increased risk of mortality with all three pollutants. Each 1 μg/m3 increase in annual PM2.5 concentrations increased the absolute annual risk of death by 0.073% (95% CI 0.071–0.076). Each 1 ppb increase in annual NO2 concentrations increased the annual risk of death by 0.003% (0.003–0.004), and each 1 ppb increase in summer O3 concentrations increased the annual risk of death by 0.081% (0.080–0.083). This increase translated to approximately 11 540 attributable deaths (95% CI 11 087–11 992) for PM2.5, 1176 attributable deaths (998–1353) for NO2, and 15 115 attributable deaths (14 896–15 333) for O3 per year for each unit increase in pollution concentrations. The effects were higher in certain subgroups, including individuals living in areas of low socioeconomic status. Long-term exposure to permissible concentrations of air pollutants increases the risk of mortality.
Estimated Mortality and Morbidity Attributable to Smoke Plumes in the United States: Not Just a Western US Problem
Katelyn O’Dell et al.
GeoHealth, September 2021
Abstract:
As anthropogenic emissions continue to decline and emissions from landscape (wild, prescribed, and agricultural) fires increase across the coming century, the relative importance of landscape-fire smoke on air quality and health in the United States (US) will increase. Landscape fires are a large source of fine particulate matter (PM2.5), which has known negative impacts on human health. The seasonal and spatial distribution, particle composition, and co-emitted species in landscape-fire emissions are different from anthropogenic sources of PM2.5. The implications of landscape-fire emissions on the sub-national temporal and spatial distribution of health events and the relative health importance of specific pollutants within smoke are not well understood. We use a health impact assessment with observation-based smoke PM2.5 to determine the sub-national distribution of mortality and the sub-national and sub-annual distribution of asthma morbidity attributable to US smoke PM2.5 from 2006 to 2018. We estimate disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) for PM2.5 and 18 gas-phase hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) in smoke. Although the majority of large landscape fires occur in the western US, we find the majority of mortality (74%) and asthma morbidity (on average 75% across 2006–2018) attributable to smoke PM2.5 occurs outside the West, due to higher population density in the East. Across the US, smoke-attributable asthma morbidity predominantly occurs in spring and summer. The number of DALYs associated with smoke PM2.5 is approximately three orders of magnitude higher than DALYs associated with gas-phase smoke HAPs. Our results indicate awareness and mitigation of landscape-fire smoke exposure is important across the US.
Evaluation of DNA damage and stress in wildlife chronically exposed to low-dose, low-dose rate radiation from the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant accident
Kelly Cunningham et al.
Environment International, October 2021
Abstract:
The health effects associated with chronic low-dose, low-dose rate (LD-LDR) exposures to environmental radiation are uncertain. All dose-effect studies conducted outside controlled laboratory conditions are challenged by inherent complexities of ecological systems and difficulties quantifying dose to free-ranging organisms in natural environments. Consequently, the effects of chronic LD-LDR radiation exposures on wildlife health remain poorly understood and much debated. Here, samples from wild boar (Sus scrofa leucomystax) and rat snakes (Elaphe spp.) were collected between 2016 and 2018 across a gradient of radiation exposures in Fukushima, Japan. In vivo biomarkers of DNA damage and stress were evaluated as a function of multiple measurements of radiation dose. Specifically, we assessed frequencies of dicentric chromosomes (Telomere-Centromere Fluorescence in situ Hybridization: TC-FISH), telomere length (Telo-FISH, qPCR), and cortisol hormone levels (Enzyme Immunoassay: EIA) in wild boar, and telomere length (qPCR) in snakes. These biological parameters were then correlated to robust calculations of radiation dose rate at the time of capture and plausible upper bound lifetime dose, both of which incorporated internal and external dose. No significant relationships were observed between dicentric chromosome frequencies or telomere length and dose rate at capture or lifetime dose (p value range: 0.20–0.97). Radiation exposure significantly associated only with cortisol, where lower concentrations were associated with higher dose rates (r2 = 0.58; p < 0.0001), a relationship that was likely due to other (unmeasured) factors. Our results suggest that wild boar and snakes chronically exposed to LD-LDR radiation sufficient to prohibit human occupancy were not experiencing significant adverse health effects as assessed by biomarkers of DNA damage and stress.
Economic Production and Biodiversity in the United States
Yuanning Liang, Ivan Rudik & Eric Zou
NBER Working Paper, October 2021
Abstract:
Species extinctions and ecological degradation are accelerating to a degree unprecedented in human history. We present causal evidence on the economic drivers of biodiversity loss using a novel panel dataset on the types and quantities of wildlife at thousands of locations across the U.S. from 1960-2015. Exploiting fiscal and regulatory shocks to local economic output, we document large, negative impacts of GDP on abundance and diversity of species spanning multiple taxa. The adverse effects of production are mitigated by conservation and air emission abatement efforts, which points toward habitat losses and pollution as underlying contributors to contemporaneous biodiversity declines.
Democratization, Elections, and Public Goods: The Evidence from Deforestation
Luke Sanford
American Journal of Political Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
This article shows that over the last three decades, competitive elections were associated with increased deforestation. Protection of forested areas provides long-term public goods, while their destruction provides short-term private goods for particular voters. Politicians facing a competitive election offer voters access to forested areas mainly for small-scale farming or commercial use of timber in exchange for electoral support. I test this theory of political deforestation using satellite generated global forest cover data and the results of over 1,000 national-level elections between 1982 and 2016. I find that countries that undergo a democratic transition lose an additional 0.8 percentage points of their forest cover each year, that years with close elections have over 1 percentage point per year higher forest cover loss compared to nonelection years, and that as the margin of victory in an election decreases by 10 points, the amount of deforestation increases by 0.7 percentage points per year. These increases are on the order of 5–10 times the average rate of forest loss globally. This suggests democratization is associated with underprovision of environmental public goods and contested elections are partially responsible for this underprovision.
Leviathan Inc. and Corporate Environmental Engagement
Po-Hsuan Hsu, Hao Liang & Pedro Matos
Management Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
In a 2010 special report, The Economist magazine termed the resurgence of state-owned, publicly listed enterprises “Leviathan Inc.” and criticized the poor governance and low efficiency of these firms. We compile a new comprehensive data set of state ownership of publicly listed firms in 44 countries over the period of 2004–2017 and show that state-owned enterprises are more responsive to environmental issues. The effect is more pronounced in economies lacking energy security and strong environmental regulation, and among firms with more local operations and higher domestic government ownership. We find a similar effect on corporate social engagement but not on governance quality. These results suggest a different role for “Leviathan Inc.,” especially in dealing with environmental externalities.
The role of energy infrastructure in shaping early adoption of electric and gasoline cars
Josef Taalbi & Hana Nielsen
Nature Energy, October 2021, Pages 970–976
Abstract:
Electric vehicles have a potential to lower greenhouse gas emissions but still face challenges. This study asks what can be learned from the US automobile history. In 1900, there were three equal contenders in the US automotive industry: gasoline, electric and steam cars. Only a decade later, the gasoline car had achieved a crushing dominance. This dominance is often attributed to techno-economic factors, such as an innate inferiority of electric cars. Meanwhile, the role of the infrastructures is not well understood. This study presents evidence on the mechanisms behind the rise of gasoline vehicles, using a database of more than 36,000 passenger car models. We estimated econometric models to explain the technology choice of car producers, which show that the slow expansion of electricity infrastructure had a key impact. We estimate that a 15 or 20 year earlier diffusion of electricity grids would have tipped the balance in favour of electric vehicles, most notably in metropolitan areas. In the context of the current climate crisis, the results support the notion that large-scale investment in infrastructure is critical to achieve sustainable socio-technological transitions.