Annually, air pollution stemming from oil and gas operations is associated with 91,000 premature fatalities and hundreds of thousands of health issues throughout the United States. Black, Asian, Native American, and Hispanic populations are consistently among the most severely affected groups. These findings come from a comprehensive new study released on August 22nd.
The researchers state that this study, published today in, represents the first complete quantification of outdoor air pollution’s health impacts across every phase of fossil fuel production, and the first analysis of disparities in exposure to these health risks.
The study investigated the complete oil and gas life cycle: upstream activities, which include oil and gas exploration and extraction; midstream operations, covering compression, transport, and storage; downstream processes, involving transformation into petrochemical products; and end use, when the product reaches its final consumption stages.
The research indicated that Native American and Hispanic populations are most significantly impacted by air pollution originating from the upstream and midstream stages, while Black and Asian populations face the greatest effects from downstream and end-use stages. Furthermore, researchers attributed 10,350 preterm births and 216,000 new annual cases of childhood asthma, alongside 1,610 lifetime cancer diagnoses across the U.S., to air pollution from oil and gas.
Though downstream activities generate less pollution than upstream and end-use operations, they are responsible for more severe adverse health effects. Black communities experience the gravest health outcomes, including early mortality, premature births, and childhood asthma. These impacts are predominantly observed in regions with major oil-refining activities, such as eastern Texas and southern Louisiana.
Researchers utilized an air pollution model to determine pollutant concentrations, then applied this data to epidemiological models to estimate the number of severe health outcomes. They based their analysis on data from 2017, the most recent year with complete information available, and suggest that their findings might be conservative, given that U.S. oil and gas production has since increased.
Eloise Marais, the study’s senior author and a professor of atmospheric chemistry and air quality at University College London, notes that the findings corroborate what communities have known for a long time. Marais commented, “We are not in our academic ‘ivory tower’ informing these communities that they are experiencing adverse health outcomes. They already know this and are engaged in processes to try and address it.” She added, “What our study does is provide truly rigorous evidence of the scale of the impact, in the hope that community leaders, advocacy groups, and policy makers will take it up… to precisely identify, in more granular detail, where these disparities are occurring, to essentially develop very clear action plans to address them.”
The researchers assert that the solution is straightforward. While greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere can persist for years, the health benefits derived from reducing air pollution are almost immediate. Marais explained, “[The study] offers a very clear perspective on the potential public health gains, which would be quite immediate if we lessen our dependence on oil and gas. We would begin to see instant benefits in air quality and health, and a large portion of the disparities in health burdens would be mitigated.”