Why we care: Dirty air in California kills more people than car crashes do
View of Greater LA (Under GNU 1.2 License)
You read the headline correctly. According to a report by researchers at California State University, Fullterton, pollution kills more people than car crashes. How do they know? They simply added up the deaths related to pollution that were reported in two of the most polluted areas in California: San Joaquin Valley and South Coast Air Basin and did some comparison. According to the California Highway Patrol, back in 2006 there were 2,521 vehicular deaths in that area. This compares to 3,812 deaths attributed to respiratory illness caused by particle pollution. There are already studies that correlate asthma, chronic bronchitis and other respiratory and coronary problems with ozone and particulate pollution. Ozone usually comes from gasoline car exhausts and particulates from soot, dust and diesel exhausts. The study also shows that reducing pollution to Federal levels would bring California a lot of benefits: fewer premature deaths, fewer heart attacks, almost half a million fewer days of work lost and 1.2 million fewer missed school days. Oh, and two million fewer cases of upper respiratory problems. If you want to think about that in money terms (although I'm no fan of mixing health and money), the bill adds up to $112 million.
[Source: The Examiner]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
noz 10:31PM (11/13/2008)
This IS one of the primary reasons I really want to leave LA...it has become a really filthy, overcrowded, and obnoxious city.
I honestly can't believe I live here sometimes...a waste of life IMO.
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slk23 12:11AM (11/14/2008)
Be glad it's better than it was in the '60s and '70s. I grew up in San Diego in the '70s and in elementary school and we couldn't play during recess if the wind was blowing the smog down from L.A. In fact, it's noticeably better than it was in the mid '80s when I would drive through going between college and home.
Air quality standards and laws really do help. Even if you have to give up backyard barbecues it's worth it if you have air like L.A. had.
Lad 11:04PM (11/13/2008)
Dud! What do you expect when your transportation systems and your electric power plant systems are based on inefficiently burning fossil chemicals in the atmosphere for over a hundred years?
It doesn't make sense to continue burning these toxic chemicals now that we have made the scientific gains necessary to produce electric drive transportation and nonpolluting power stations.
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John Rowell 12:34AM (11/14/2008)
As a resident of the San Joaquin Valley, I take the air problem very seriously. Too bad most of my neighbors don't. The Sierra Nevada mountains are only about 20 miles from where I live, yet they are only visible on those few clear days mostly in the spring. You can go for weeks at a time in the summer without seeing the mountains which are so near. If I take a day trip up to the hills, the air is so clean and when I return I can smell all those toxic chemicals. The farmers are allowed so much leeway in their pesticides applications, without regard for the health effects. Many of the kids in the community have asthma. You can survive by barricading yourself in a closed-up house with HEPA filters running day and night, but what kind of life is that? Hopefully the situation will improve sooner rather than later.
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GenWaylaid 3:33AM (11/14/2008)
California would be the nicest, most beautiful place on earth if all the people just up and left. Sigh.
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Brn 12:36PM (11/14/2008)
Would it still be beautiful if no one was there to see it?
GenWaylaid 1:59AM (11/15/2008)
I'm sure the bears would still enjoy it immensely. ;)
state 7:03AM (11/14/2008)
"According to a report by researchers at California State University, Fullterton, pollution kills more people than car crashes."
Wow. And yet the car crazy gas guzzling folks in California still drive everywhere and blame everyone but themselves.
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Phyte 10:51AM (11/14/2008)
"Wow. And yet the car crazy gas guzzling folks in California still drive everywhere and blame everyone but themselves."
Isn't that the typical liberal thinking?
Geoff Gibson 4:18PM (11/14/2008)
Your statement doesn't even make any sense. California has some of the most stringent and strictest environmental laws anywhere in the U.S.
Truth be told, Los Angeles' air quality wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the mountains that surround the city and create a "bowl" like effect where the smog just pools up.
Now, I'm not saying that more can't be done, however there is nobody that I know of personally (and I live about 1 mile away from Cal State Fullerton) that blames everybody else for our air quality problems. It's just a bad combination of geography, poor mass transit, and the love of cars that stemmed from rapid urbanization of the suburbs in the 1950s that created our hectic freeway system as you see it today.
That said, Californians are making strides it getting more progressive on alternative modes of transportation. Just look at this last election where Prop 1A passed which will build one of the largest bullet train systems in the world and it's all for transporting Californians to other parts of California cheaply and effectively.
Finally, if Californians drive nothing but gas guzzling cars then why the HELL am I driving a PZEV version of a car that in no other state is required. For the 2008 model year car the new Mitsubishi Lancer was required to be a PZEV model in California reducing the emissions and increasing the gas mileage. In no other state is this required and I am pretty sure that in no other state is a PZEV version of this vehicle even sold.
Dawn 12:59PM (11/14/2008)
While there's more work to be done, some of the benefits noted by slk23 is due to new clean diesel on-road vehicles (which now have PM emissions at virtually imperceptible levels). Off-road construction, locomotive and agricultural equipment will soon meet similarly tough emissions standards. Most importantly, the state is providing funds to support the installation of retrofit technology which can reduce emissions between 25-90%.
Hopefully Californians will start buying new clean diesel passenger cars available right now that are as clean as gasoline, get 20-40% better fuel economy and emit 20% less CO2. These benefits will grow further with the use of biodiesel and other renewable diesel fuels. Who knows when plug in hybrid cars will be commercially available with today's economic situation.
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lorincdm 5:16PM (11/14/2008)
The problem with changing emisiions standards is, since new cars make up only a tiny percent of sales, it will take a long time before the improvements expected are met, assuming all new cars produce fewer emissions. Furthermore, I think federal emissions laws should set the baseline, and allow every state to set their own based on that.
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