Research Hub

Typically, minority populations and impoverished peoples tend to be exposed to environmental hazards significantly more often than other demographic populations (Bullard, 2000). Oftentimes these exploited communities do not have the necessary resources to relocate, or have the political voice to deny the industry residency in their community. This research explores what environmental injustice looks like in Alabama, specifically examining the key players in local, state, and federal governance that have decision-making power in environmental justice (EJ) communities, the ways in which EJ issues affect residents and the community, and the ways in which communities are organizing for environmental justice. Our results have shown that frustration by EJ communities in Alabama have resulted from lack of participation in the decision-making process within local, state, and federal levels as well as a lack of effort to consider EJ as a serious issue by these entities. Residents perceive these issues as attacks on their quality of life, their culture, and their ability to pursue happiness. When organizing for environmental justice, important items residents and key informants highlighted were networking and building alliances across state lines, connecting environmental and social issues as a part of the framing of their issues, appropriate and representational leaders, and building connections amongst both social and environmental organizations. Through the use of Critical Race Theory as our theoretical framework, we were able to analyze racial dynamics at play between entities involved with environmental justice organizing in Alabama.

Published Jan 1, 2016

Pennington, M., & Ph.D, S. C. (2016). Unconventional Wisdom. University of Montevallo TRIO McNair Scholars Program 2016 Research Journal. https://www.montevallo.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/journal-2016-complete.pdf#page=186

Climate change is inextricably linked to economic inequality: it is a crisis that is driven by the greenhouse gas emissions of the 'haves' that hits the 'have-nots' the hardest.

While COP21 in Paris will see a deal negotiated between governments on the basis of the total emissions produced in their territories, the real winners and losers will be their citizens. The true test of the deal will be whether it delivers something for the poorest people who are both the least responsible for and the most vulnerable to climate change, wherever they live.

In this briefing Oxfam presents new data analysis that demonstrates the extent of global carbon inequality by estimating and comparing the lifestyle consumption emissions of rich and poor citizens in different countries. See also the technical briefing on the methodology and the data sets.

Published Dec 2, 2015

Oxfam 2015. Extreme Carbon Inequality. http://hdl.handle.net/10546/582545

Background:
The indoor built environment plays a critical role in our overall well-being because of both the amount of time we spend indoors (~90%) and the ability of buildings to positively or negatively influence our health. The advent of sustainable design or green building strategies reinvigorated questions regarding the specific factors in buildings that lead to optimized conditions for health and productivity.
Objective:
We simulated indoor environmental quality (IEQ) conditions in “Green” and “Conventional” buildings and evaluated the impacts on an objective measure of human performance: higher-order cognitive function.
Methods:
Twenty-four participants spent 6 full work days (0900–1700 hours) in an environmentally controlled office space, blinded to test conditions. On different days, they were exposed to IEQ conditions representative of Conventional [high concentrations of volatile organic compounds (VOCs)] and Green (low concentrations of VOCs) office buildings in the United States. Additional conditions simulated a Green building with a high outdoor air ventilation rate (labeled Green+) and artificially elevated carbon dioxide (CO2) levels independent of ventilation.
Results:
On average, cognitive scores were 61% higher on the Green building day and 101% higher on the two Green+ building days than on the Conventional building day (p < 0.0001). VOCs and CO2 were independently associated with cognitive scores. Conclusions: Cognitive function scores were significantly better under Green+ building conditions than in the Conventional building conditions for all nine functional domains. These findings have wide-ranging implications because this study was designed to reflect conditions that are commonly encountered every day in many indoor environments.

Published Oct 26, 2015

Allen, J. G., MacNaughton, P., Satish, U., Santanam, S., Vallarino, J., & Spengler, J. D. (2015). Associations of Cognitive Function Scores with Carbon Dioxide, Ventilation, and Volatile Organic Compound Exposures in Office Workers: A Controlled Exposure Study of Green and Conventional Office Environments. Environmental Health Perspectives, 124(6), 805–812. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP.1510037

IMPORTANCE: Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are ubiquitous and neurotoxic environmental contaminants. Prenatal PAH exposure is associated with subsequent cognitive and behavioral disturbances in childhood. OBJECTIVES: To identify the effects of prenatal PAH exposure on brain structure and to assess the cognitive and behavioral correlates of those abnormalities in school-age children. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: Cross-sectional imaging study in a representative community-based cohort followed up prospectively from the fetal period to ages 7 to 9 years. The setting was urban community residences and an academic imaging center. Participants included a sample of 40 minority urban youth born to Latina (Dominican) or African American women. They were recruited between February 2, 1998, and March 17, 2006. MAINOUTCOMES AND MEASURES: Morphological measures that index local volumes of the surface of the brain and of the white matter surface after cortical gray matter was removed. RESULTS: We detected a dose-response relationship between increased prenatal PAH exposure (measured in the third trimester but thought to index exposure for all of gestation) and reductions of the white matter surface in later childhood that were confined almost exclusively to the left hemisphere of the brain and that involved almost its entire surface. Reduced left hemisphere white matter was associated with slower information processing speed during intelligence testing and with more severe externalizing behavioral problems, including attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder symptoms and conduct disorder problems. The magnitude of left hemisphere white matter disturbances mediated the significant association of PAH exposure with slower processing speed. In addition, measures of postnatal PAH exposure correlated with white matter surface measures in dorsal prefrontal regions bilaterally when controlling for prenatal PAH. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: Our findings suggest that prenatal exposure to PAH air pollutants contributes to slower processing speed, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder symptoms, and externalizing problems in urban youth by disrupting the development of left hemisphere white matter, whereas postnatal PAH exposure contributes to additional disturbances in the development of white matter in dorsal prefrontal regions.

Published Jun 1, 2015

Peterson, B. S., Rauh, V. A., Bansal, R., Hao, X., Toth, Z., Nati, G., Walsh, K., Miller, R. L., Arias, F., Semanek, D., & Perera, F. (2015). Effects of prenatal exposure to air pollutants (polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons) on the development of brain white matter, cognition, and behavior in later childhood. JAMA Psychiatry, 72(6), 531–540. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2015.57

China is facing serious issues involving energy sufficiency, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and air pollution caused partly by the rapid growth of vehicles. In order to relieve those problems, new energy vehicles are introduced into the bus and car market. We adopt life cycle analysis to evaluate the well-to-wheels (WTW) energy consumption, CO2 emissions and pollutant emissions from the traditional diesel bus and new energy buses, including diesel hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs), compressed natural gas vehicles (CNGVs) and battery electric vehicles (BEVs). This study reports the current situation and projects future scenarios for the BEV bus for several regions in China due to significant regional differences in the power generation mix. Compared to the diesel bus, the HEV bus can reduce petroleum, fossil fuel use and CO2 emissions by about 20%, and, at the same time, produce stable reduction benefits for all air pollutants. The CNG bus achieves reductions of WTW primary PM2.5 emissions by 70% over its diesel counterpart and, of course, uses little petroleum; but increases fossil fuel consumption moderately and has no benefit in GHG emissions. The BEV bus can deliver a substantial petroleum consumption advantage and greatly reduce the WTW NOX, VOC and CO emissions; but, if the electricity is generated from burning coal, the BEV bus has no PM2.5 emission benefit compared to the conventional diesel bus. Currently, the BEV bus increases fossil energy use and CO2 emissions in the coal-dominated regions; but, in the future, it can achieve substantially lower fossil energy use and CO2 emissions with more penetration of clean electric energy. To reach the win-win strategy, a city's initial reliance on diesel buses for the public fleet has to give way to a mixture of these new energy buses; and the fleet mix should be diversified over the region and modified over time to accommodate changes in these energy and environmental parameters.

Published Jun 1, 2015

Wang, R., Wu, Y., Ke, W., Zhang, S., Zhou, B., & Hao, J. (2015). Can propulsion and fuel diversity for the bus fleet achieve the win-win strategy of energy conservation and environmental protection? Applied Energy, 147, 92–103. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2015.01.107

In the latter half of the 20th century, Los Angeles had, by many measures, higher levels of photochemical air pollutants than any other major city in the United States (Figure 1). To address this problem, the California Air Resources Board and its partners became leaders in quantifying the health effects of air pollutants and in aggressively implementing pollution-control strategies.

Published Mar 5, 2015

Douglas W. Dockery, Sc.D., and James H. Ware, P. D. (2014). Cleaner Air, Bigger Lungs. New England Journal of Medicine, 1–2. https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMsa1201918.6.

BACKGROUND
Air-pollution levels have been trending downward progressively over the past several decades in southern California, as a result of the implementation of air quality–control policies. We assessed whether long-term reductions in pollution were associated with improvements in respiratory health among children.

METHODS
As part of the Children’s Health Study, we measured lung function annually in 2120 children from three separate cohorts corresponding to three separate calendar periods: 1994–1998, 1997–2001, and 2007–2011. Mean ages of the children within each cohort were 11 years at the beginning of the period and 15 years at the end. Linear-regression models were used to examine the relationship between declining pollution levels over time and lung-function development from 11 to 15 years of age, measured as the increases in forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1) and forced vital capacity (FVC) during that period (referred to as 4-year growth in FEV1 and FVC).

RESULTS
Over the 13 years spanned by the three cohorts, improvements in 4-year growth of both FEV1 and FVC were associated with declining levels of nitrogen dioxide (P<0.001 for FEV1 and FVC) and of particulate matter with an aerodynamic diameter of less than 2.5 μm (P= 0.008 for FEV1 and P<0.001 for FVC) and less than 10 μm (P<0.001 for FEV1 and FVC). These associations persisted after adjustment for several potential confounders. Significant improvements in lung-function development were observed in both boys and girls and in children with asthma and children without asthma. The proportions of children with clinically low FEV1 (defined as <80% of the predicted value) at 15 years of age declined significantly, from 7.9% to 6.3% to 3.6% across the three periods, as the air quality improved (P=0.001). CONCLUSIONS We found that long-term improvements in air quality were associated with statistically and clinically significant positive effects on lung-function growth in children. (Funded by the Health Effects Institute and others.)

Published Mar 5, 2015

Gauderman WJ, Urman R, Avol E, et al. Association of improved air quality with lung development in children. N Engl J Med. 2015;372(10):905-913. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa1414123

Air pollution is a suspected developmental neurotoxicant. Many schools are located in
close proximity to busy roads, and traffic air pollution peaks when children are at school. We
aimed to assess whether exposure of children in primary school to traffic-related air pollutants is associated with impaired cognitive development.

Published Mar 3, 2015

Sunyer, J., Esnaola, M., Alvarez-Pedrerol, M., Forns, J., Rivas, I., López-Vicente, M., Suades-González, E., Foraster, M., Garcia-Esteban, R., Basagaña, X., Viana, M., Cirach, M., Moreno, T., Alastuey, A., Sebastian-Galles, N., Nieuwenhuijsen, M., & Querol, X. (2015). Association between Traffic-Related Air Pollution in Schools and Cognitive Development in Primary School Children: A Prospective Cohort Study. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1001792

Here, we present an expert consensus document on behalf of the European Society of Cardiology that explores the mechanisms and relationships between ambient air pollution and cardiovascular disease. The purpose of this document is to highlight and raise awareness of the importance and wide-ranging impact of air pollution on cardiovascular disease. It will also provide guidance to society, patients, and healthcare professionals on the potential health impacts of air pollution, and make recommendations for future public health and research priorities to manage and mitigate this avoidable cause of death and disease.

Published Jan 27, 2015

Newby, D. E., Mannucci, P. M., Tell, G. S., Baccarelli, A. A., Brook, R. D., Donaldson, K., Forastiere, F., Franchini, M., Franco, O. H., Graham, I., Hoek, G., Hoffmann, B., Hoylaerts, M. F., Künzli, N., Mills, N., Pekkanen, J., Peters, A., Piepoli, M. F., Rajagopalan, S., & Storey, R. F. (2015). Expert position paper on air pollution and cardiovascular disease. European Heart Journal, 36(2), 83–93. https://doi.org/10.1093/eurheartj/ehu458

Rationale: Few studies have examined associations between longterm exposure to fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and lung function decline in adults. Objectives: To determine if exposure to traffic and PM2.5 is associated with longitudinal changes in lung function in a population-based cohort in the Northeastern United States, where pollution levels are relatively low. Methods: FEV1 and FVC were measured up to two times between 1995 and 2011 among 6,339 participants of the Framingham Offspring or Third Generation studies. We tested associations between residential proximity to a major roadway and PM2.5 exposure in 2001 (estimated by a land-use model using satellite measurements of aerosol optical thickness) and lung function. We examined differences in average lung function using mixed-effects models and differences in lung function decline using linear regression models. Current smokers were excluded. Models were adjusted for age, sex, height, weight, pack-years, socioeconomic status indicators, cohort, time, season, and weather. Measurements and Main Results: Living less than 100 m from a major roadway was associated with a 23.2 ml (95% confidence interval [CI], -44.4 to -1.9) lower FEV1 and a 5.0 ml/yr (95% CI, -9.0 to -0.9) faster decline in FEV1 compared with more than 400 m. Each 2 μg/m3 increase in average of PM2.5 was associated with a 13.5 ml (95% CI, -26.6 to -0.3) lower FEV1 and a 2.1 ml/yr (95% CI, -4.1 to -0.2) faster decline in FEV1 There were similar associations with FVC. Associations with FEV1/FVC ratio were weak or absent. Conclusions: Long-term exposure to traffic and PM2.5, at relatively low levels, was associated with lower FEV1 and FVC and an accelerated rate of lung function decline.

Published Jan 23, 2015

Rice, M. B., Ljungman, P. L., Wilker, E. H., Dorans, K. S., Gold, D. R., Schwartz, J., Koutrakis, P., Washko, G. R., O’Connor, G. T., & Mittleman, M. A. (2015). Long-term exposure to traffic emissions and fine particulate matter and lung function decline in the Framingham Heart Study. American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, 191(6), 656–664. https://doi.org/10.1164/rccm.201410-1875OC