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Assessing the Feasibility of Performing an Air Accountability Study in New Haven, CT
Citation:
OZKAYNAK, H. A., D. T. LOBDELL, V. Isakov, J. TOUMA, J. M. BURKE, AND M. SMUTS. Assessing the Feasibility of Performing an Air Accountability Study in New Haven, CT. Presented at American Association of Aerosol Research Conference, San Diego, CA, March 22 - 26, 2010.
Impact/Purpose:
The main objective of this EPA study was to examine the feasibility of conducting a local (e.g., city level) assessment of the public health impacts of cumulative air pollution reduction activities (a.k.a. accountability) from the federal, state, local and voluntary actions in the City of New Haven, CT (population ~ 127,288) for a variety of health outcomes.
Description:
The main objective of this EPA study was to examine the feasibility of conducting a local (e.g., city level) assessment of the public health impacts of cumulative air pollution reduction activities (a.k.a. accountability) from the federal, state, local and voluntary actions in the City of New Haven, CT (population ~ 127,288) for a variety of health outcomes. Overall, this project provided new and tractable approaches on how to link health surveillance data with environmental data and population exposure estimates. In particular, the multidisciplinary study team conducted: detailed local scale point and area source inventories for the City; linked-based traffic emission modeling; spatially and temporally highly resolved combined regional (CMAQ) and local scale (AERMOD) multipollutant modeling (instead of GIS interpolation of sparse monitoring data and much simpler model results); coupled modeling of air quality and exposures for numerous criteria pollutants and air toxics; assessed the air quality between 2001 and 2030 based on projected air quality improvements for local, state and federal actions; compared different EPA exposure models (HAPEM and SHEDS), and; demonstrated the importance ofemploying novel approaches in performing community health and accountability studies over relatively small urban areas by using multi-scale modeling tools. Using the comprehensive information gathered on local health and exposure-related data, the researchers then assessed the feasibility for conducting an accountability study in New Haven for 34 different pollutant/health outcome linkages. The air quality modeling results showed a modest overall decrease (~1 0%-30%) in median pollutant concentrations mainly from local sources and mostly between 2001 and 2010 but greater than 60% decreases were projected for NOx. Considerable spatial variability in concentrations was found within the city for most pollutants. Based on statistical power calculations, the only feasible pollutant/health outcome linkages were found for NOx related improvements with all-cause mortality, asthma diagnosis for children, and respiratory hospitalizations. For other pollutants with more modest reductions, including PM, the likelihood of performing a successful traditional accountability analysis in New Haven was determined to be poor. However, in such situations alternative epidemiological study designs that incorporate spatially and temporally resolved air quality and exposure models in characterizing intra urban gradients may be more promising. In conclusion, this project successfully applied, compared, and evaluated exposure assessment and epidemiological modeling tools in the context of observed public health status in a relatively small community, New Haven, CT, and provided EPA, local, state, and city organizations with a new methodology to measure the impact of risk mitigation approaches and regulations. Furthermore, since no single regulation or program that impacts air can be isolated to track its effect on health, this project provided critical findings on how EPA may examine the complex interactions of cumulative impacts on air quality and health effects from multiple actions. (This is an abstract of a proposed presentation and does not necessarily reflect EPA policy.) This cumulative air accountability study examined the feasibility of conducting a local assessment ofthe public health impacts ofmultiple pollution reduction activities in the City ofNew Haven, CT for different health outcomes. Multi-scale air quality and exposure modeling tools (CMAQ, AERMOD, HAPEM and SHEDS) were used to estimate multiyear pollution levels. Power calculations based on these results showed that the only feasible pollutantlhealth outcome linkages were for NOx related improvements with all-cause mortality, asthma diagnosis for children, and respiratory hospitalizations. For PM and othe~ pollutants alternative epidemiological study designs based on modeled intra urban gradients seem promising.