In the simplistic view of "the environment" common among policy makers and the press, an artificial line separates wildlife and natural resource issues – saving the whales, protecting the rainforests – from human health concerns like toxic chemicals in consumer products. (Look more closely, of course, and you realize that everything is connected.) Global warming, because its worst impacts lie sometime in the future and are, you know, global, is not usually discussed as a threat to your preschooler's health – right now, today, in your back yard. The week before Christmas, when the EPA denied a petition by California and other states to regulate greenhouse gases from cars and trucks, one of the Agency's arguments was that there is a lack of evidence linking carbon emissions to specific health effects.
Now Stanford scientists have produced the first study quantifying the health effects of air pollution attributed solely to climate change – in other words, they've found that the hotter it gets, the more unhealthy the air gets. It's already happening, and it's affecting states with the most severe air pollution, like California, more than other places. This strikes hard at the EPA's position that states can't regulate carbon emissions because global warming is a matter of national policy only. Mark Jacobson, the atmospheric scientist who did the study, told The Sacramento Bee:
"The study shows carbon dioxide is causing the health impacts, it quantifies those impacts and shows California has been impacted greater than other states. . . . They [EPA] should revisit their decision."
The study, to be published in Geophysical Research Letters, predicts that for every 1 degree Celsius (1.8 degrees Farenheit) increase in temperature caused by carbon dioxide, 1,000 more Americans will die annually – 300 more a year in California – and 20 to 30 more will get cancer. Jacobson says it's a clear cause-and-effect relationship, not just a statistical connection.
The killer is smog, or ozone, which forms more rapidly in hotter weather. But there's a feedback loop: Jacobson used computer models to show that warming speeds ozone formation more rapidly in cities that are already smoggy. California has six of the 10 smoggiest cities in the nation, so it's clear that global warming is a more immediate health threat here than in, say, Wyoming.
Jacobson's findings, and more studies to come, could have very far-reaching impacts, perhaps elevating global warming to a top-tier health concern. This would be a most welcome development, for the tendency to keep "nature" and "health" separate has led some elected officials to embrace an environmentalism Lite, standing up for wilderness and national parks but ignoring the need for reform of chemical policy, which might upset industry. Gov. Schwarzenegger, for one, has been far more aggressive in taking on global warming than tackling public health issues.
We'll also get to see how the Bush Administration reacts to evidence that California has a legitimate public health interest in trying to regulate greenhouse gases. The Administration has resisted every effort by the state for five years, so don't hold your breath. Then again, maybe you should.