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Neighborhood-level map shows your household's cancer risk from poisonous air

Photo by Bruno Miguel on Unsplash

Chemical plants near residential areas can make hazardous air, increasing cancer risks.

When you take a deep breath, it's good to know what you're breathing in. If living in the wildfire West has taught me anything, it's that you can't always rely on your nose to know how clean the air is. On really bad Air Quality Index (AQI) days, we see and smell smoke, but the AQI can still be unhealthy even if the air seems clear.

A new ProPublica analysis of data from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) shows that some of us may be living in places with toxic air pollution from industrial chemicals and not know it. Air polluted with hazardous chemicals can cause various kinds of cancer, but until now it wasn't simple to see what your own household risk was.

With ProPublica's interactive, neighborhood-level map, now you can.

And you might want to—especially if you live in Texas, which apparently has a quarter of the 20 hot spots with the highest excess cancer risk. Nothing like getting rid of those pesky environmental regulations, eh?

As explained in ProPublica's article about the first-of-its-kind map:

"At the map's intimate scale, it's possible to see up close how a massive chemical plant near a high school in Port Neches, Texas, laces the air with benzene, an aromatic gas that can cause leukemia. Or how a manufacturing facility in New Castle, Delaware, for years blanketed a day care playground with ethylene oxide, a highly toxic chemical that can lead to lymphoma and breast cancer. Our analysis found that ethylene oxide is the biggest contributor to excess industrial cancer risk from air pollutants nationwide. Corporations across the United States, but especially in Texas and Louisiana, manufacture the colorless, odorless gas, which lingers in the air for months and is highly mutagenic, meaning it can alter DNA."

Yeah. Not great.

Also not great is how people of color are more affected by toxic air pollution. ProPublica shared these statistics: "Census tracts where the majority of residents are people of color experience about 40% more cancer-causing industrial air pollution on average than tracts where the residents are mostly white. In predominantly Black census tracts, the estimated cancer risk from toxic air pollution is more than double that of majority-white tracts."

After reviewing the map, Wayne Davis, an environmental scientist formerly with the EPA's Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, told ProPublica, "The public is going to learn that EPA allows a hell of a lot of pollution to occur that the public does not think is occurring."

Most people's air is within a safe range, but there are certain hot spots near industrial plants where cancer risk is many times higher than what the EPA deems acceptable. The EPA examines air pollution from certain types of facilities and industries in isolation, not taking into consideration how hazardous air might compound in a cluster of hot spots and put the people living near them at much higher risk.

Matthew Tejada, director of the EPA's Office of Environmental Justice, told ProPublica it would take "working back through 50 years of environmental regulation in the United States, and unpacking and untying a whole series of knots" to address these high-risk hot spots.

The whole ProPublica report, which you can find here, is worth a read. You can access the interactive map here. (Scroll down a bit to find the bar to enter your city, zip code or street address.)

From Your Site Articles

Take a deep breath and don't worry, we've got some top-shelf tips to avoid air pollution.

"It's like trying to breathe through a tiny, tiny straw," said Samantha Kamen. Not even a regular straw, but like one of those little red coffee stirrers.

This is how Kamen, marketing and communications manager for the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, describes an asthma attack. It's a condition she's had since she was young. "It's a really scary feeling."

One of the top causes of an asthma attack? Air pollution. And it doesn't just affect asthma sufferers. More than half of Americans live in areas with unhealthy levels of air pollution. And it's been associated with heart disease, lung cancer, and respiratory problems.

Luckily, it's not a hopeless cause. There are lots of things people can do to help limit their exposure and reduce air pollution in their own communities. Here are 10 of them.

1. Know thy enemy with some daily recon.

AIRNow is a website by the EPA that gives daily air quality ratings for your area. Check it before going out the door. And if you're on the go, they have an app for iPhone and Android as well!

2. Know which way the wind is blowing.

Turns out weather forecasts don't just tell you rain or shine, they can also predict the wind. Check out your local weather station or weather.com for wind forecasts. If you know you're about get a face full of freeway exhaust, it might be time to close those windows.

3. Opt for the morning workout.

Your lungs might thank you for not hitting that snooze. One of the most common components of air pollution, ozone, tends to peak during warm, sunny afternoons. Ozone: good up high in the atmosphere, bad in your lungs. If you're planning on exercising, consider taking advantage of the morning's relatively cleaner air or do indoors activities instead.

4. Bundle your chores and trips together.

GIF via Justin Timberlake, Vevo/YouTube.

If air pollution is bad on any particular day, try to keep trips outside to a minimum by bundling chores and errands into one trip. Instead of going for a walk in the morning, then to the dry cleaners in the afternoon, then to the store to pick up milk in the evening, one trip out can limit your exposure. (And psst: See #7 below. Driving around less is great news for the air we breathe too.)

5. Keep those pollutants out of your home.

Why bring trouble home with you? Don't smoke indoors or burn trash or wood. Buy electric power and lawn tools when you can, rather than gas-powered ones. Be aware of things like scented candles. Those fragrances might smell nice, but they can sometimes dump pollutants into the air you breathe.

If you need a little extra help getting the toxins out of your home, you can purchase high-efficiency air filters. They catch a lot of the floating particles that make up smog and other forms of air pollution, purifying the air in your house.

6. Enjoy the great outdoors.

One way to get away from man-made pollution is to get out of the city altogether. Maybe instead of hitting up a city park for a picnic, find a nice spot in the countryside instead.

Need some ideas? Check out the National Park Services' Find a Park feature.

7. Ditch the car.

Cars are one of the biggest contributors to air pollution. Travel by carpool or public transportation, whenever possible. Fewer cars on the road mean fewer emissions, after all. If you live in a place where you have to drive, keep your engine up to snuff, tires filled, and don't idle (and ask your local schools not to idle the buses too).

8. Change those lightbulbs.

GIF from "Parks and Recreation."

Not only will you be able to see better at night, but replacing old lightbulbs and refrigerators with energy efficient ones means a lighter load at the power plant. If it's a coal or gas-fired plant, that means less emissions. Plus, it'll save you some money. Win-win.

9. Finally, encourage your city or state to join in as well.

Call your city's mayor or state representative and help push for policies that will cut down on air pollution. The World Health Organization notes that, unfortunately, many of the biggest sources of air pollution, like industrial factories or freeways, are really out of an individual person's hands. That's why it's important for cities and states to take action and encourage things like mass transit, clean energy, and better urban planning.

*Takes deep breath*

We can feel the air getting cleaner already!

This snuggly-looking fella loves breathing easier.

Heroes

This incredible mural was made from car exhaust. Yes, really.

Anirudh Sharma remembers the air pollution growing up in India — he just didn't remember it being so bad.

When he took a trip home in 2013, while on break as a student at MIT's Media Lab, the difference in air quality between India and Boston couldn't have been starker.

A street in New Delhi in 2013. Photo by Prakash Singh/AFP/Getty Images.

“It was a very simple observation — I feel like anybody can see it," Sharma says of the pollution's effects in his home country. "Your clothes get dirtier much faster, you can see this pigmentation happening [on] buildings, to your clothes, to everywhere around you."

Sharma found himself wondering: Is there any way to put this awful black gunk to good use? He realized how similar the soot was to the black ink in your standard ballpoint pen, and the comparison prompted him to begin digging deeper.

Inspired by what he saw on his trip, Sharma and fellow co-founder Nikhil Kaushik launched Graviky Labs.

Sharma (far left), Kaushik (middle left), and the rest of the Graviky Labs team. Photo courtesy of Graviky Labs.

The team is the mastermind behind Air-Ink — an ink that's made from the dirty black pollution emitted from vehicles.

Photo courtesy of Graviky Labs.

As you can imagine, it takes a few steps to go from air pollution to black ink that's safe for anyone to use.

First, Sharma and his team came up with what they dubbed a "Kaalink" — a device that connects with a vehicle's exhaust pipe to collect soot and pollutants that would otherwise be jetting out into the open air while the engine is running.

Photo courtesy of Graviky Labs.

Graviky Labs then takes the soot and pollutants and removes harmful or unnecessary materials — like metals and carcinogens — so all that's left is a carbon rich pigment that can be made into various inks and paints.

As of now, Air-Ink is available in various sizes of markers, as well as a printing ink set — and the process of making them is smart for a few reasons.

Photo courtesy of Graviky Labs.

The obvious positive aspect to Air-Ink is that it prevents pollutants from getting into the atmosphere, keeping our air healthier to breathe. But it also curbs our reliance on conventional ink-making methods that rely on the deliberate burning of fossil fuels to get the job done, Graviky Labs notes.

“We are trying to not only capture pollution and recycle pollution," Kaushik explains, but they're also ensuring less carbon is being emitted from other ink-making sources.

In other words, it's a win-win.

Of course, it also helps that the ink can produce some pretty incredible works of art.

Photo courtesy of Graviky Labs.

Right now, Air-Ink is only available through a Kickstarter campaign, which is aiming to expand Graviky Labs' operations.

Through funds raised online, Sharma's team is planning to also create oil-based, fabric, and outdoor paints. And from the looks of it, Air-Ink is on the right track to success.

With three weeks still left to go of the campaign, Graviky Labs' Kickstarter has already surpassed its initial fundraising goal of nearly $10,000.

"It feels great,” co-founder Kaushik says of the campaign's success thus far. “We have heard from a lot of people that they want to use it."

Air-Ink won't solve the world's air pollution problems in the long-term. But it's the right type of idea the world needs now.

Most eco-friendly innovations combating climate change and curbing pollution are expensive "replacement" technologies — such as electric cars replacing gas-powered ones — and other things that take longer to go mainstream economically, according to Kaushik. Over the next few years, however, it'll be crucial that we develop less expensive adaptations that can be applied to current technologies (even those as basic as ink production) that will help make the planet greener in the meantime. That's where innovations like Air-Ink come in.

“This is something that can help," Kaushik says. "But it has to be part of a bigger system where other technologies and other innovations pitch in."

Learn more about Air-Ink by watching the video below:

Heroes

When these teens took on Baltimore over a garbage idea, the city actually listened.

True

What do you do with your free time? 17-year-old Destiny Watford spends hers saving her neighborhood.

Destiny lives in Baltimore, a city where more people die from air pollution than homicide — and the homicide rate is nothing to scoff at.

This isn’t an exaggeration; it’s a reality. And the people who live there deal with it every day.

Why is the air pollution so bad? Well, Curtis Bay — a neighborhood in Baltimore — is home to a coal export terminal, the nation’s largest medical waste facility, and an animal rendering plant, to name a few reasons.

All images via Starbucks, used with permission.

In 2012, Destiny learned about a plan to build the country’s largest trash-burning incinerator in Curtis Bay just a mile from her school.

Destiny looked around at her neighborhood, polluted by factory after factory, and decided she’d had enough.

Watch Destiny's full story:

These students banded together and stopped what would have been the nation's largest trash incinerator from being built just a mile away from their school. A Starbucks original series.
Posted by Upworthy on Friday, September 23, 2016

You may wonder, how could the country so completely disregard the health of these residents?

There's a reason Curtis Bay and communities like it are often the proposed sites for these types of facilities (ahem, environmental racism). A study published in Environmental Research Letters revealed that factories using toxic substances and waste plants are usually found in poor neighborhoods — and those neighborhoods are often predominantly made up of people of color.

The phenomenon is nothing new. History has shown time and time again that poor neighborhoods are often used as dumping grounds. See the Flint water crisis.

The communities being affected often don’t have a voice to fight against this injustice. That’s why Destiny is so special.

Determined to stop the incinerator from invading their neighborhood, Destiny and her classmates started a movement.

"Curtis Bay is my home," explained Destiny. "I grew up here. I live here. My family lives here. My friends live here. If a development like this is happening that would be putting our lives at risk, I couldn't ignore it."

She and her peers started Free Your Voice, an organization aimed at stopping the development of the incinerator.

They found out that the Baltimore City Public School System would be purchasing energy from the incinerator and challenged that decision. They won — the school board changed its decision and backed out of the contract. 21 other businesses followed suit.

Then, something even bigger happened.

"We learned that the incinerator’s permit had expired," Destiny said. "This was a huge opportunity for us because with an expired permit, you can’t construct. But it would not matter unless the Maryland Department of the Environment said publicly, 'Your permits are expired.' Which they hadn’t."

Free Your Voice organized protests, with people standing outside late into the night, urging the department to enforce the law and stop the incinerator.

It took months, but eventually the state did declare that the permit was expired, effectively halting all operations.

The community united, and their unified, persistent voice was loud enough to be heard.

Thanks to Destiny and her peers, the future of Curtis Bay — and its air — is clearer.

And Destiny led the charge. Her passion for her community inspired positive change. If more communities follow suit, hopefully together, they can force the tide to change.

A before-and-after snapshot shows the incredible impact of clean cookstoves.

True

Cooking dinner usually results in, well, dinner. But for too many people, it can have a devastating side effect.

For the 3 billion people in developing countries who cook their meals over an open fire, dinner preparation can be a silent killer (and I don't mean from boring table talk).

In fact, it's one of the biggest — and least known — killers of women and kids around the world.

Image via Ed Brambley/Flickr (cropped).

Over 4 million people die every year from inhaling the toxic pollution from unsafe stoves.

Can you imagine?

Having to cook over an open fire — burning dung, coal, and wood for fuel — is comparable to smoking two packs of cigarettes a day. Not to mention how dangerous it is to live around an open flame every day. Clumsy or not, that's a recipe for burns — or worse.

Luckily, some innovative folks created a cookstove that's pretty incredible. It's saving the lives of moms and kids — and creating jobs.

Image via Esther Havens/The Adventure Project, used with permission.

These charcoal-efficient cookstoves, currently making the rounds in Kenya, are drastically reducing smoke from cooking fires and cutting in half the amount of charcoal needed.

They come from the folks at The Adventure Project, and the impact they've made so far is quite mind-blowing. You don't have to just take my word for it, you can see it for yourself:

Image via Esther Havens/The Adventure Project, used with permission.

The benefits of using charcoal-efficient stoves extend way beyond the food they help to prepare.

According to the group, every stove saves a family 20% of their daily expenses because they use 50% less charcoal per day. And it helps save them time too. In Kenya, the average woman can spend up to 30 hours a week just collecting firewood. But that's not necessary with a clean cookstove.

When Mary bought a stove, it meant her kids could finally go to school.

Image via Esther Havens/The Adventure Project, used with permission.

She no longer has to spend so much money on firewood, and now she's able to send her kids to get an education.

"I am using more money for school fees and buying house goods like food," she told The Adventure Project. "Although the school fees are quite an amount, I can pay them and save money. Every month I spent 1000 on firewood but now I only spend 400 shillings so I can save 600 shillings."

In less than two years, 17,876 charcoal-efficient stoves have been sold in Kenya.

According to The Adventure Project, these stoves have helped more than 89,000 people and saved over 107,000 trees from being cut down.

In other words, they're working.

And perhaps the best part is that The Adventure Project doesn't just give the stoves away. Their model is meant to last.

The organization invests in training people in Kenya, like this stove entrepreneur named Josephat, to make the stoves and sell them at an affordable price to their neighbors. And they make sure everyone is able to afford a stove, even the extremely poor, through low-interest loans. It creates sustainable local business.

Image via Esther Havens/The Adventure Project, used with permission.

Safe and reliable access to energy for cooking is a basic need.

And when you move past the top-line data points and measurements of a cookstove's immediate impact, you can't forget the human element it brings: Progress like this can help families bond and grow closer. Mary can attest to that.

"If they inhaled the smoke they would have very bad coughing and I feared for their health," she recalled. "Now, with the coal stove I can cook comfortably in the kitchen, my husband can finally sit in the kitchen with me and talk to me."

Image via Esther Havens/The Adventure Project, used with permission.

Our global food system is transforming for good — and we're only just beginning. The Adventure Project is just one group out there focused on clean cookstoves and taking small sustainable steps toward a better world.

Helping kids grow healthier, local economies succeed, and families lift themselves out of poverty ... all because of a stove? It's very much happening.

Heroes

They spent 20 years developing this aircraft engine. Can it change the future of aviation?

True

At any given moment, there are about 5,000 planes flying above the United States.

87,000 flights take place per day. Millions of flights per year. And that's just the United States.

With that volume of air traffic, needless to say, a new type of aircraft engine — one that produces 75% less noise for those on the ground and burns 16% less fuel — is a huge deal for both people and the planet.

It’s called the PurePower^® Geared Turbofan™ engine, and after 20 years in development at Pratt & Whitney, a division of United Technologies, it’s going to change the game of aviation.

See for yourself what makes this engine so special:

So what’s the secret? The basic concept is this: Pratt & Whitney’s engine is designed with a high bypass ratio, meaning that 12 times the amount of airflow passes around the engine’s core versus going through the core itself, which makes the engine more efficient overall.

Higher efficiency means less fuel burn, and less fuel burn means fewer emissions.

Still not impressed? Here's the kicker: This new aircraft engine reduces annual carbon dioxide emissions by 3,600 metric tons per plane.

At a time when our environment is in serious need of some tender loving care, cutting our carbon footprint in any way we can is more important than ever.

But even we'll admit that 3,600 metric tons of carbon dioxide is pretty hard to visualize. So what does that actually mean?

It's the equivalent of 766 cars being taken off the road for an entire year.

Calculated differently, that's 279,574 cars being taken off the road for a day — only a few thousand cars shy of the daily traffic crossing from New Jersey into New York City.

What if nearly all the cars driving into NYC simply didn’t show up one day? The resulting reduction of carbon dioxide would be equivalent to a single PurePower engine.

It's also equivalent to more than 4.6 million households using absolutely no electricity for 24 hours.

About 4,660,000 households, actually.

That’s like if everyone who lives in New York City (3 million households) Los Angeles (1.3 million households), and Las Vegas (213,000 households) used no electricity whatsoever for 24 hours.

It's even equivalent to 5,419 people going vegetarian for a whole year.

Typical meat eaters have a bigger carbon footprint than vegetarians — even those who only eat the USDA recommended 0.21 pound of meat per day (or less).

Have you ever considered going vegetarian for a year to reduce your impact on the environment? How about convincing 5,418 people to do it with you? Your collective impact would equal that of just one PurePower engine.

Chances are, commuters aren’t just going to suddenly stop driving into NYC. But that’s why innovations like this aircraft engine are so important.

As Pratt & Whitney Engineer Monica Dujic explains, “There is a future in aviation that can help the environment ... and the people around you.”

Now that is something worth celebrating.