Air Pollution Risks

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Air Pollution Risks

• The Causality Loop of Human Activity and its
  Consequences
• Brandon Gustafson

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Causality Loop

• Human activity and its associated risks operate
  in a loop
• Populations engage in many activities that
  increases affect their welfare, such as .
• Some of These activities spur a chain of events
  that leads to the associated risk to humans. of
  these activities
• These risks tend to diminish some welfare gained
  by these activities. of the the work to
  further(??) effect welfare
• Recognizing the environmental consequences of
  human activities, corrective actions are taken to
  mitigate the negative effects.
• These corrective actions change the environment
  itself and the cycle repeats
• This presentation will detail the steps and
  provide an example
• Using the example we will estimate ways to reduce
  the risks
• Next we will put our example in perspective
• Finally we offer some commentary and some
  analysis

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Causality Loop (either describe or eliminate)
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General Description

• Given Population
• Participates in activities which increase welfare
• Goods and Services are in demand to provide for
  these activities
• Goods and services require materials

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General Description

• Materials flow causes pollution of varying
  concentrations
• Pollutants at varying concentrations have varying
  effects
• Each effect posses different risks to humans

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General Description

• These risks in turn effect our welfare
• Our welfare being effected causes us to develop
  policy for action
• These actions lead to a changes in our activity

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Quantification of Risk
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Quantification of Risk

• Start with a given population
• Engages in a activities person
• Which requires g goods and services per
  activity
• In turn requires m materials per good and
  service required

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Quantification of Risk

• The use of materials produces pollution with
  concentration c per mass flow of material
• The concentration level has effect e per
  concentrate
• Which produces risk r per effect

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Quantification of RiskRisk agmcerP

• The coefficients are multiplied to find the
  overall risk
• This effects welfare and action is taken
• To reduce risk action can be taken at any node
  affecting the coefficient associated with it and
  thus the overall equation

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Key Features

• The entire process functions in a loop
• Each action is connected to overall welfare
• Overall welfare affects future action
• Ideally an equilibrium is reached where utility
  is maximized while risk is minimized
• Utility define

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Example

• People like to consume electricity
• They use it to increase their personal utility or
  welfare everyday
• To meet the demands power companies have to
  generate enough electricity

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California Electricity

• 33.9 Million people used 78 TWh of electricity
  residentially in the year 2000
• 61.9 kWh per dollar () GSP
• Or, 2300 kWh per person

Brown, Richard E. and Jonathon G. Koomey,
Electricity Use in California Past Trends and
Present Usage Patterns May 2002 UC-Berkley
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California Pollution

• Raw materials such as coal and other fossil fuels
  flow to power production plants
• Pollution is produced
• Pollution in units of pounds per kWh is listed
  below for 8 major pollutants

Leonardo Academy Inc. Emission Factors and
Energy Prices for the Cleaner Greener
Environmental Program January 2003
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Pollution Density

• Table depicts the amount of pollution per person
• However, this is only accounting for residential
  use, which is typically the end use anyway

Leonardo Academy Inc. Emission Factors and
Energy Prices for the Cleaner Greener
Environmental Program January 2003
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California Effects (improve structure)

• The effects of these pollutants are mild and
  severe
• Respiratory problems to simply (?) impaired
  visibility
• Especially the young, the old, and the asthmatic

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California Risks

• The risk depends on the person
• Nationally, each year 50,000 people are estimated
  to have died from air pollution
• Those with previous lung conditions are at the
  greatest risk
• Although, we are all at elevated risk .???

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Welfare to Action

• Reduced health and death reduce welfare
• Reduced welfare spurs action
• Governmental agencies set pollution limits
• California Air Resources Board website goes online

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Types of Actions

• To increase welfare and/or reduce risk
• Reducing the population would reduce risk
• Reducing activity will decrease risk but may also
  decrease welfare
• Use less materials i.e. be more efficient
• Output lower concentrations of pollutants
• Output pollutants that have less effect and
  associated risk

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Actions and the Causality Coefficients

• At each node actions can be taken to reduce the
  overall risk
• Population is difficult to change but people can
  change their actions

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Action Example

• People can turn their lights off sooner in the
  day and use 5 less electricity
• Engineers can improve transmissions lines and
  light bulb efficiency so that each activity
  requires 5 fewer kWh

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Action Example

• Engineers can increase factory efficiency by 5,
  using less raw materials to produce each kWh
• Factories can use different fuels that have 5
  less pollutants in terms of concentration

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Action Example

• Care can be taken in selecting fuels and
  combustion techniques so that the effect of any
  pollutants emitted is reduced by 5
• Communities can plan where to build factories and
  people can be smart about when they conduct
  certain activities reducing the risk by 5

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Action Example

• These simple reductions lead to an overall
  decrease of 26.5 of what it otherwise would be
• 0.95a0.95g0.95m0.95c0.95e0.95rP
  0.735(agmcerP) 26.5 reduction

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World Perspective

• Although different units, the comparison is
  striking

http//www.worldbank.org/nipr/wdi98/table3.12.pdf
WHO Healthy Cities Air Management Information
System and the World Resources Institute 1996
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Comments and Analysis

• Each action is made through a single
  (individual?) decision
• However, the consequences to these actions are
  borne by all !!!
• This is known as an externality and subsequently
  is a market failure
• People are not aware of the full environmental
  and other costs of conducting their action and
  therein lies the problem
• To remedy this problem the community can educate
  but this provides little incentive
• In truth (gee how do YOU know the truth?) ,
  education combined with externality taxation is
  best

• Improvement can be made at any node
• However, factory efficiency is pretty good and
  marginal improvements are small (???)
• The big improvements need to come from efficiency
  of human activity (???)
• More activity does not always mean better welfare
  but it does mean greater risk
• Also in the long run a shift to a cleaner energy
  source is a must

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Summary

• The Causation Loop of Human Activity is a cycle
• Human welfare is adjusted up and down
  respectively by increased human activity which
  leads to increased risk
• The cycle was explained and an example was
  presented to demonstrate the cycle
• A hypothetical example experiment estimated the
  ways to reduce the overall risk of activity
• After analyzing a US city, the numbers were put
  into perspective with the rest of the world
• Finally comments and analysis were offered
• More concrete summary