Estimating State-Specific Contributions to PM2.5- and O3-Related Health Burden from Residential Combustion and Electricity Generating Unit Emissions in the United States

Background: Residential combustion (RC) and electricity generating unit (EGU) emissions adversely impact air quality and human health by increasing ambient concentrations of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and ozone (O3). Studies to date have not isolated contributing emissions by state of origin (source-state), which is necessary for policy makers to determine efficient strategies to decrease health impacts. Objectives: In this study, we aimed to estimate health impacts (premature mortalities) attributable to PM2.5 and O3 from RC and EGU emissions by precursor species, source sector, and source-state in the continental United States for 2005. Methods: We used the Community Multiscale Air Quality model employing the decoupled direct method to quantify changes in air quality and epidemiological evidence to determine concentration–response functions to calculate associated health impacts. Results: We estimated 21,000 premature mortalities per year from EGU emissions, driven by sulfur dioxide emissions forming PM2.5. More than half of EGU health impacts are attributable to emissions from eight states with significant coal combustion and large downwind populations. We estimate 10,000 premature mortalities per year from RC emissions, driven by primary PM2.5 emissions. States with large populations and significant residential wood combustion dominate RC health impacts. Annual mortality risk per thousand tons of precursor emissions (health damage functions) varied significantly across source-states for both source sectors and all precursor pollutants. Conclusions: Our findings reinforce the importance of pollutant-specific, location-specific, and source-specific models of health impacts in design of health-risk minimizing emissions control policies. Citation: Penn SL, Arunachalam S, Woody M, Heiger-Bernays W, Tripodis Y, Levy JI. 2017. Estimating state-specific contributions to PM2.5- and O3-related health burden from residential combustion and electricity generating unit emissions in the United States. Environ Health Perspect 125:324–332; http://dx.doi.org/10.1289/EHP550

[1]  Bryan J. Hubbell,et al.  Two reduced form air quality modeling techniques for rapidly calculating pollutant mitigation potential across many sources, locations and precursor emission types , 2014 .

[2]  R. Burnett,et al.  Extended follow-up and spatial analysis of the American Cancer Society study linking particulate air pollution and mortality. , 2009, Research report.

[3]  Yongtao Hu,et al.  Decoupled direct 3D sensitivity analysis for particulate matter (DDM-3D/PM) , 2006 .

[4]  Jonathan I. Levy,et al.  Ozone Exposure and Mortality: An Empiric Bayes Metaregression Analysis , 2005, Epidemiology.

[5]  Bryan J. Hubbell,et al.  The influence of location, source, and emission type in estimates of the human health benefits of reducing a ton of air pollution , 2009, Air quality, atmosphere, & health.

[6]  Sharon Phillips,et al.  Compilation and interpretation of photochemical model performance statistics published between 2006 and 2012 , 2012 .

[7]  F. Dominici,et al.  Ozone and short-term mortality in 95 US urban communities, 1987-2000. , 2004, JAMA.

[8]  Scott L. Zeger,et al.  Spatial and Temporal Variation in PM2.5 Chemical Composition in the United States for Health Effects Studies , 2007, Environmental health perspectives.

[9]  A. M. Dunker,et al.  Implementing the decoupled direct method for sensitivity analysis in a particulate matter air quality model. , 2007, Environmental science & technology.

[10]  Mehmet T. Odman,et al.  Single-Source Impact Analysis Using Three-Dimensional Air Quality Models , 2008, Journal of the Air & Waste Management Association.

[11]  Ian A. Waitz,et al.  Air pollution and early deaths in the United States. Part I: Quantifying the impact of major sectors in 2005 , 2013 .

[12]  P. J. Rasch,et al.  CAM-chem: description and evaluation of interactive atmospheric chemistry in CESM , 2011 .

[13]  I. Uno,et al.  Source contributions of sulfate aerosol over East Asia estimated by CMAQ-DDM. , 2012, Environmental science & technology.

[14]  A. M. Dunker.  The decoupled direct method for calculating sensitivity coefficients in chemical kinetics , 1984 .

[15]  Lisa Conner,et al.  Expert judgment assessment of the mortality impact of changes in ambient fine particulate matter in the U.S. , 2008, Environmental science & technology.

[16]  M. Bell,et al.  Meta-analysis of the association between short-term exposure to ambient ozone and respiratory hospital admissions , 2011, Environmental research letters : ERL [Web site].

[17]  D. Byun.  Science algorithms of the EPA Models-3 community multi-scale air quality (CMAQ) modeling system , 1999 .

[18]  A. Russell,et al.  Potential impact of climate change on air pollution-related human health effects. , 2009, Environmental science & technology.

[19]  Neal Fann,et al.  The public health context for PM2.5 and ozone air quality trends , 2013, Air Quality, Atmosphere & Health.

[20]  Saravanan Arunachalam,et al.  Current and Future Particulate‐Matter‐Related Mortality Risks in the United States from Aviation Emissions During Landing and Takeoff , 2012, Risk analysis : an official publication of the Society for Risk Analysis.

[21]  Frances Silverman,et al.  Inhalation of Fine Particulate Air Pollution and Ozone Causes Acute Arterial Vasoconstriction in Healthy Adults , 2002 .

[22]  Kazuhiko Ito,et al.  Long-term ozone exposure and mortality. , 2009, The New England journal of medicine.

[23]  Kazuhiko Ito,et al.  Associations Between Ozone and Daily Mortality: Analysis and Meta-Analysis , 2005, Epidemiology.

[24]  Jeffrey M. Vukovich,et al.  Emission inventory development and processing for the Seasonal Model for Regional Air Quality (SMRAQ) project , 2000 .

[25]  Antonella Zanobetti,et al.  Fine particulate air pollution and its components in association with cause-specific emergency admissions , 2009, Environmental health : a global access science source.

[26]  Greg Yarwood,et al.  The decoupled direct method for sensitivity analysis in a three-dimensional air quality model--implementation, accuracy, and efficiency. , 2002, Environmental science & technology.

[27]  Neal Fann,et al.  The recent and future health burden of air pollution apportioned across U.S. sectors. , 2013, Environmental science & technology.

[28]  J. Stockman.  Main Air Pollutants and Myocardial Infarction: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis , 2013 .

[29]  Jeffrey Young,et al.  Incremental testing of the Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) modeling system version 4.7 , 2009 .

[30]  D. Byun,et al.  Review of the Governing Equations, Computational Algorithms, and Other Components of the Models-3 Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) Modeling System , 2006 .

[31]  J. Schwartz.  How sensitive is the association between ozone and daily deaths to control for temperature? , 2005, American journal of respiratory and critical care medicine.

[32]  Stefani L. Penn,et al.  Carbon reductions and health co-benefits from US residential energy efficiency measures , 2016 .

[33]  Bryan J. Hubbell,et al.  Methodological considerations in developing local-scale health impact assessments: balancing national, regional, and local data , 2009 .

[34]  S. Schubert,et al.  MERRA: NASA’s Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications , 2011 .

[35]  Michelle L. Bell,et al.  A Meta-Analysis of Time-Series Studies of Ozone and Mortality With Comparison to the National Morbidity, Mortality, and Air Pollution Study , 2005, Epidemiology.