Air quality equity in US climate policy

The United States government has indicated a desire to advance environmental justice through climate policy. As fossil fuel combustion produces both conventional pollutants and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, climate mitigation strategies may provide an opportunity to address historical inequities i...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS 2023-06, Vol.120 (26), p.e2217124120-e2217124120
Main Authors: Polonik, Pascal, Ricke, Katharine, Reese, Sean, Burney, Jennifer
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Air pollution
Air quality
Climate change mitigation
Climate policy
Emissions
Emissions control
Environmental justice
Fossil fuels
Fuel combustion
Greenhouse gases
Paris Agreement
Physical Sciences
Social Sciences
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The United States government has indicated a desire to advance environmental justice through climate policy. As fossil fuel combustion produces both conventional pollutants and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, climate mitigation strategies may provide an opportunity to address historical inequities in air pollution exposure. To test the impact of climate policy implementation choices on air quality equity, we develop a broad range of GHG reduction scenarios that are each consistent with the US Paris Accord target and model the resulting air pollution changes. Using idealized decision criteria, we show that least cost and income-based emission reductions can exacerbate air pollution disparities for communities of color. With a suite of randomized experiments that facilitates exploration of a wider climate policy decision space, we show that disparities largely persist despite declines in average pollution exposure, but that reducing transportation emissions has the most potential to reduce racial inequities.
ISSN:0027-8424
1091-6490
DOI:10.1073/pnas.2217124120