Good news for our families: Cutting air pollution generated by burning fossil fuels would save over 50,000 lives and provide more than $600 billion in health benefits, researchers at the University of Wisconsin have found. The researchers also conclude that clean energy policy like that proposed by the Biden administration is key to reducing the worst sources of harmful air pollution: coal-fired power plants, gasoline-powered cars and trucks, and buildings and industries fueled by coal, oil, and natural gas. While other studies have linked air pollution to fossil fuels, this may be the first that specifically highlights the important role public policy can and must play in achieving air quality goals.
In addition to money and lives saved, the study’s authors note that an average of 69% of the health benefits from eliminating emissions in a region will remain in that region. In other words, taking action locally to burn less oil, gas, and coal in favor of more wind and solar will directly help clean up the air and improve the quality of life for people living where those actions occur.
Burning less fossil fuels will also help communities and the country as a whole achieve goals to stop climate change. “Transitioning energy production away from fossil fuels and toward cleaner sources can produce health benefits from improved air quality in the near term while also providing climate benefits in the longer term,” the scientists write.
“Clean energy policy can greatly improve human health by reducing sources of harmful air pollution,” they add. “The current air quality-related health burden associated with fossil fuels is substantial.”
Fossil fuel combustion releases fine particulate matter, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxides, all of which are among the largest environmental risk factors for disease in the US. Premature mortality from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), respiratory infections, lung cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and stroke have all been linked to fossil fuel emissions. Air pollution can also trigger asthma attacks in kids and threaten the health of pregnant women and newborns, a recent study by the American Lung Association showed.
Climate change poses its own serious health and safety risks. Severe weather events and catastrophic wildfires can destroy entire communities. Extreme heat related to climate change is already sending more children to hospital emergency rooms.
While the study’s authors acknowledge that “there is a clean energy transition underway,” they say that it is happening too slowly to forestall global warming. “Deep and rapid cuts in GHG emissions are needed in all energy-related sectors … if states and the country as a whole are to … avoid the worst impacts of climate change.”
The researchers approvingly point to a dozen states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico, all of which have set a goal to produce 100% of their electricity from clean or carbon-free sources, in many cases by between 2040 and 2050, while other states have set similar nonbinding goals. Some states, like California, are requiring that all new passenger vehicles sold by 2035 be zero-emission. Governors in Louisiana and Michigan have issued executive orders calling for economy-wide “carbon neutrality.” Individual counties, like this one in Maryland, are also creating groundbreaking climate change goals. And of course, the Biden administration is urging 100% carbon-free electricity nationwide by 2035, and net-zero emissions economy-wide by no later than 2050.
The study emphasizes the advantages of transitioning to clean energy as much as it warns about the dangers of not doing so. “We are trying to shift mindsets from burdens to benefits,” Prof. Jonathan A. Patz at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies told the Washington Post.
“Shifting to clean energy sources can provide enormous benefit for public health in the near term while mitigating climate change in the longer term.”