Mortality, Air Pollution, and Energy Production: Uncertainty and Causality

U.S. -- EC fuel cycle study: Background document to the approach and issues

“…Many studies have attempted to compare health impacts of air pollutants deriving from different fuel cycles. Selected examples include: Hamilton (1974); Morgan et al (1978); Morris et al (1979); Inhaber (1979); El-Bassioni (1980); OECD (1982); NAS-NRC (1982); Novak, Bozzo, and Hamilton (1984); Gotchy's analysis reported in NUREG-0332 (1987); EPRI (1987); Holdren (1987); Fritzsche (1989); Cox and Ricci (1990); ; and Senior Expert Symposium (1991). Thus, one might assume that exposure-response models for health effects from various fuel cycles are reasonably well known and adequately catalogued.…”

“…While Morgan et al (1978) focus on sulphur emissions, they cautioned readers to remember that significant mortality may also result from nitrates, heavy metals, and interaction among power plant effluents and with other pollutants in the environment. Ricci (1990) discusses epidemiological studies and analyses upon which risk coefficients for fossil pollutants are based.…”

“…On the more optimistic end of the distribution of opinions is a remark by Gotchy (1987) that pollution versus health effect correlations, such as used by Lave and Sesldn, are not adequate without other toxicological and epidemiological data but when interpreted as a whole, ca_: provide order-of-magnitude precision. Somewhat more pessimistic views have been expressed by others, such as Cox and Ricci (1990), who note that uncertainty is intrinsic and unavoidable in risk assessment and the choice of a dose-response function relating ambient levels of emissions from a power plant to resulting public-health consequences may be determined by regulatory fiat tempered by scientific hypotheses, theory, and empirical data. House (1981) similarly expressed that the high levels of uncertainty in health-related statistics add a dimension of confusion to pollution or safety information that only confuses the decision maker.…”

“…House (1981) similarly expressed that the high levels of uncertainty in health-related statistics add a dimension of confusion to pollution or safety information that only confuses the decision maker. Also, Ricci (1990) noted that airborne pollutants are generic and cannot be traced to a single source and that the 95% confidence interval for excess deaths in 1985 from airborne pollutants ranges from 0 to 250,000: "Such data are so primitive that it is questionable whether they can truly be considered information." However, for health effects other than mortality, the exposureresponse relationships are more promising.…”