Regional Estimates of Chemical Composition of Fine Particulate Matter Using a Combined Geoscience-Statistical Method with Information from Satellites, Models, and Monitors

Donkelaar, Aaron van; Martin, Randall V.; Li, Chi; Burnett, Richard T.

doi:10.1021/acs.est.8b06392

Cited by 526 publications

(353 citation statements)

References 58 publications

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“…Center. 19 This source provides the most comprehensive county level COVID-19 data to date reported by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and state health departments.…”

Section: Johns Hopkins University Center For Systems Science and Engmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exposure to air pollution and COVID-19 mortality in the United States: A nationwide cross-sectional study

Nethery

Sabath

et al. 2020

Preprint

939

904

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Background: United States government scientists estimate that COVID-19 may kill between 100,000 and 240,000 Americans. The majority of the pre-existing conditions that increase the risk of death for COVID-19 are the same diseases that are affected by long-term exposure to air pollution. We investigate whether long-term average exposure to fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) increases the risk of COVID-19 deaths in the United States.Methods: Data was collected for approximately 3,000 counties in the United States (98% of the population) up to April 04, 2020. We fit zero-inflated negative binomial mixed models using county level COVID-19 deaths as the outcome and county level long-term average of PM 2.5 as the exposure. We adjust by population size, hospital beds, number of individuals tested, weather, and socioeconomic and behavioral variables including, but not limited to obesity and smoking. We include a random intercept by state to account for potential correlation in counties within the same state. Results:We found that an increase of only 1 ߤ g/m 3 in PM 2.5 is associated with a 15% increase in the COVID-19 death rate, 95% confidence interval (CI) (5%, 25%). Results are statistically significant and robust to secondary and sensitivity analyses. Conclusions:A small increase in long-term exposure to PM 2.5 leads to a large increase in COVID-19 death rate, with the magnitude of increase 20 times that observed for PM 2.5 and allcause mortality. The study results underscore the importance of continuing to enforce existing air pollution regulations to protect human health both during and after the COVID-19 crisis. The data and code are publicly available.

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“…Center. 19 This source provides the most comprehensive county level COVID-19 data to date reported by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and state health departments.…”

Section: Johns Hopkins University Center For Systems Science and Engmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exposure to air pollution and COVID-19 mortality in the United States: A nationwide cross-sectional study

Nethery

Sabath

et al. 2020

Preprint

939

904

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…However, attempts to estimate highresolution PM 2.5 speciation concentrations have been few. Some works [7,12,13] used satellite-based total aerosol optical depth (AOD) and composition information from the CTMs to estimate PM 2.5 speciation concentrations. For example, global PM 2.5 chemical composition were inferred by combining AOD with conversion factors between AOD and PM 2.5 species provided by the GEOS-Chem model [12].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Random forest models for PM_2.5 speciation concentrations using MISR fractional AODs

Geng

Meng

et al. 2020

Environ. Res. Lett.

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It is increasingly recognized that various chemical components of PM 2.5 might have differential toxicities to human health, although such studies are hindered by the sparse or non-existent coverage of ground PM 2.5 speciation monitors. The Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) onboard the Terra satellite has an innovative design to provide information about aerosol shape, size and extinction that are more related to PM 2.5 speciation concentrations. In this study, we developed random forest models that incorporated ground measurements of PM 2.5 species, MISR fractional AODs, simulated PM 2.5 speciation concentrations from a chemical transport model (CTM), land use variables and meteorological fields, to predict ground-level daily PM 2.5 sulfate, nitrate, organic carbon (OC) and elemental carbon (EC) concentrations in California between 2005 and 2014. Our models had out-of-bag R 2 of 0.72, 0.70, 0.68 and 0.70 for sulfate, nitrate, OC and EC, respectively. We also conducted sensitivity tests to explore the influence of variable selection on model performance. Results show that if there are sufficient ground measurements and predictor data to support the most sophisticated model structure, fractional AODs and total AOD have similar predicting power in estimating PM 2.5 species. Otherwise, models using fractional AODs outperform those with total AOD. PM 2.5 speciation concentrations are more sensitive to land use variables than other supporting data (e.g., CTM simulations and meteorological information).

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“…For PM 2.5 , we can complement the monitor-based measure with an alternative which combines satellite observations of aerosol optical depth, simulations from a chemical transport model, and information from EPA monitors (van Donkelaar et al, 2019). 22 There are advantages and disadvantages to this alternative measure.…”

Section: Pollution Datamentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of Car Pollution on Infant and Child Health: Evidence from Emissions Cheating

Alexander

Schwandt²

2019

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Car exhaust is a major source of air pollution, but little is known about its impacts on population health due to socioeconomic selection, measurement error, and avoidance behaviors. We exploit the dispersion of emissions-cheating diesel cars-which secretly polluted up to 150 times as much as gasoline cars-across the United States from 2008-2015 as a unique opportunity to overcome these empirical challenges and measure the health impacts of car pollution. Using the universe of vehicle registrations, we demonstrate that a 10 percent cheating-induced increase in car exhaust increases rates of low birth weight and acute asthma attacks among children by 1.9 and 8.0 percent, respectively. These health impacts occur at all pollution levels and across the entire socioeconomic spectrum. * Diane Alexander (dalexand@frbchi.org) is an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. Hannes Schwandt (schwandt@northwestern.edu) is an assistant professor of economics at the School for Education and Social Policy at Northwestern University. We are thankful to 1 threats to causal inference, including socio-economic selection, avoidance behavior, and measurement error. In this paper, we exploit a unique natural experiment that overcomes these empirical challenges.In 2008, a new generation of supposedly clean diesel passenger cars was introduced to the U.S. market. 3 These new diesel cars were marketed to environmentally conscious consumers, with advertising emphasizing the power and mileage typical for diesel engines in combination with unprecedented low emissions levels. Clean diesel cars won the Green Car of the Year Award in 2009 and 2010, and quickly gained market share. By 2015, over 600,000 cars with clean diesel technology were sold in the United States. In the fall of 2015, however, it was discovered that these cars covertly activated equipment during emissions tests that reduced emissions below official thresholds, and then reversed course after testing. In street use, a single "clean diesel" car could pollute as much nitrogen oxide (NO X ; a precursor to fine particulate matter and ground-level ozone) as 150 equivalent gasoline cars. 4 Hereafter, we refer to cars with "clean diesel" technology as cheating diesel cars.The dispersion of these cheating diesel cars across the United States gives us a unique opportunity to measure the causal effect of car pollution on infant and child health. This natural experiment provides several unique features. First, it is typically difficult to infer causal effects from observed correlations of health and car pollution, as wealthier individuals tend to sort into less-polluted areas and drive newer, less-polluting cars. The fast roll-out of cheating diesel cars provides us with plausibly exogenous variation in car pollution exposure across the entire socioeconomic spectrum of the United States. Second, it is well established that people avoid known pollution, which can mute estimated impacts of air pollution on health (Neidell, 2009). Moderate pollution increases stemming from cheatin...

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Regional Estimates of Chemical Composition of Fine Particulate Matter Using a Combined Geoscience-Statistical Method with Information from Satellites, Models, and Monitors

Cited by 526 publications

References 58 publications

Exposure to air pollution and COVID-19 mortality in the United States: A nationwide cross-sectional study

Exposure to air pollution and COVID-19 mortality in the United States: A nationwide cross-sectional study

Random forest models for PM_2.5 speciation concentrations using MISR fractional AODs

The Impact of Car Pollution on Infant and Child Health: Evidence from Emissions Cheating

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Regional Estimates of Chemical Composition of Fine Particulate Matter Using a Combined Geoscience-Statistical Method with Information from Satellites, Models, and Monitors

Cited by 526 publications

References 58 publications

Exposure to air pollution and COVID-19 mortality in the United States: A nationwide cross-sectional study

Exposure to air pollution and COVID-19 mortality in the United States: A nationwide cross-sectional study

Random forest models for PM2.5 speciation concentrations using MISR fractional AODs

The Impact of Car Pollution on Infant and Child Health: Evidence from Emissions Cheating

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Product

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Random forest models for PM_2.5 speciation concentrations using MISR fractional AODs