IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v16y2019i17p3079-d260659.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

African American Exposure to Prescribed Fire Smoke in Georgia, USA

Author

Listed:
  • Cassandra Johnson Gaither

    (USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station, Athens, GA 30602, USA)

  • Sadia Afrin

    (Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27607, USA)

  • Fernando Garcia-Menendez

    (Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27607, USA)

  • M. Talat Odman

    (School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332, USA)

  • Ran Huang

    (School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332, USA)

  • Scott Goodrick

    (USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station, Athens, GA 30602, USA)

  • Alan Ricardo da Silva

    (Department of Statistics, University of Brasília, Brasília 70910-900, Brazil)

Abstract

Our project examines the association between percent African American and smoke pollution in the form of prescribed burn-sourced, fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) in the U.S. state of Georgia for 2018. (1) Background: African Americans constitute 32.4% of Georgia’s population, making it the largest racial/ethnic minority group in the state followed by Hispanic Americans at 9.8%. African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and lower wealth groups are more likely than most middle and upper income White Americans to be exposed to environmental pollutants. This is true because racial and ethnic minorities are more likely to live in urban areas where pollution is more concentrated. As a point of departure, we examine PM 2.5 concentrations specific to prescribed fire smoke, which typically emanates from fires occurring in rural or peri-urban areas. Two objectives are specified: a) examine the association between percent African American and PM 2.5 concentrations at the census tract level for Georgia, and b) identify emitters of PM 2.5 concentrations that exceed National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for the 24-h average, i. e., >35 µg/m 3 . (2) Methods: For the first objective, we estimate a spatial Durbin error model (SDEM) where pollution concentration (PM 2.5 ) estimates for 1683 census tracts are regressed on percent of the human population that is African American or Hispanic; lives in mobile homes; and is employed in agriculture and related occupations. Also included as controls are percent evergreen forest, percent mixed evergreen/deciduous forest, and variables denoting lagged explanatory and error variables, respectively. For the second objective, we merge parcel and prescribed burn permit data to identify landowners who conduct prescribed fires that produce smoke exceeding the NAAQS. (3) Results: Percent African American and mobile home dweller are positively related to PM 2.5 concentrations; and government and non-industrial private landowners are the greatest contributors to exceedance levels (4) Conclusions: Reasons for higher PM 2.5 concentrations in areas with higher African American and mobile home percent are not clear, although we suspect that neither group is a primary contributor to prescribed burn smoke but rather tend to live proximate to entities, both public and private, that are. Also, non-industrial private landowners who generated prescribed burn smoke exceeding NAAQS are wealthier than others, which suggests that African American and other environmental justice populations are less likely to contribute to exceedance levels in the state.

Suggested Citation

  • Cassandra Johnson Gaither & Sadia Afrin & Fernando Garcia-Menendez & M. Talat Odman & Ran Huang & Scott Goodrick & Alan Ricardo da Silva, 2019. "African American Exposure to Prescribed Fire Smoke in Georgia, USA," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(17), pages 1-15, August.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:16:y:2019:i:17:p:3079-:d:260659
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/16/17/3079/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/16/17/3079/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mohai, P. & Lantz, P.M. & Morenoff, J. & House, J.S. & Mero, R.P., 2009. "Racial and socioeconomic disparities in residential proximity to polluting industrial facilities: evidence from the Americans' Changing Lives Study," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 99(S3), pages 649-656.
    2. Ran Huang & Yongtao Hu & Armistead G. Russell & James A. Mulholland & M. Talat Odman, 2019. "The Impacts of Prescribed Fire on PM 2.5 Air Quality and Human Health: Application to Asthma-Related Emergency Room Visits in Georgia, USA," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(13), pages 1-14, June.
    3. Walton, Z.L. & Poudyal, N.C. & Hepinstall-Cymerman, J. & Johnson Gaither, C. & Boley, B.B., 2016. "Exploring the role of forest resources in reducing community vulnerability to the heat effects of climate change," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 94-102.
    4. Deaton, B. James & Baxter, Jamie & Bratt, Carolyn S., 2009. "Examining the consequences and character of "heir property"," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(8-9), pages 2344-2353, June.
    5. James P. LeSage, 2014. "What Regional Scientists Need to Know about Spatial Econometrics," The Review of Regional Studies, Southern Regional Science Association, vol. 44(1), pages 13-32, Spring.
    6. repec:rre:publsh:v:40:y:2010:i:2:p:159-79 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Mulatu Wubneh & Guoqiang Shen, 2004. "The Impact of Manufactured Housing on Adjacent Residential Property Values: A GIS Approach Based on Three North Carolina Counties," Review of Urban & Regional Development Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(1), pages 56-73, March.
    8. Burkey, Mark L., 2010. "Geographic access and demand in the market for alcohol," MPRA Paper 36913, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Lei Jiang & Henk Folmer & Minhe Ji & Jianjun Tang, 2017. "Energy efficiency in the Chinese provinces: a fixed effects stochastic frontier spatial Durbin error panel analysis," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 58(2), pages 301-319, March.
    10. Jones, M.R. & Diez-Roux, A.V. & Hajat, A. & Kershaw, K.N. & O'Neill, M.S. & Guallar, E. & Post, W.S. & Kaufman, J.D. & Navas-Acien, A., 2014. "Race/ethnicity, residential segregation, and exposure to ambient air pollution: The Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA)," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 104(11), pages 2130-2137.
    11. J. Elhorst, 2010. "Applied Spatial Econometrics: Raising the Bar," Spatial Economic Analysis, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 5(1), pages 9-28.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sumi Hoshiko & Joseph R. Buckman & Caitlin G. Jones & Kirstin R. Yeomans & Austin Mello & Ruwan Thilakaratne & Eric Sergienko & Kristina Allen & Lisa Bello & Ana G. Rappold, 2023. "Responses to Wildfire and Prescribed Fire Smoke: A Survey of a Medically Vulnerable Adult Population in the Wildland-Urban Interface, Mariposa County, California," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(2), pages 1-13, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Piotr Ciżkowicz & Magda Ciżkowicz-Pękała & Piotr Pękała & Andrzej Rzońca, 2017. "The effects of special economic zones on employment and investment: a spatial panel modeling perspective," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 17(3), pages 571-605.
    2. Ariane Amin & Johanna Choumert, 2015. "Development and biodiversity conservation in Sub-Saharan Africa: A spatial analysis," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 35(1), pages 729-744.
    3. Azémar, Céline & Desbordes, Rodolphe & Wooton, Ian, 2020. "Is international tax competition only about taxes? A market-based perspective," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(4), pages 891-912.
    4. Haller, Peter & Heuermann, Daniel F., 2016. "Job search and hiring in local labor markets: Spillovers in regional matching functions," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 125-138.
    5. Shishir Shakya & Alicia Plemmons & Juan Tomas Sayago-Gomez, 2022. "Spatial spillovers and the productivity-compensation gap in the United States," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 68(3), pages 669-689, June.
    6. Kadam, Parag & Magnan, Nicholas & Dwivedi, Puneet, 2023. "A spatial dependence approach to assessing the impacts of Sustainable Forestry Initiative’s Fiber Sourcing certification on forestry Best Management Practices in Georgia, United States," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    7. Grineski, Sara & Collins, Tim & Renteria, Roger & Rubio, Ricardo, 2021. "Multigenerational immigrant trajectories and children's unequal exposure to fine particulate matter in the US," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 282(C).
    8. Simon K. C. Cheung & Tommy K. Y. Cheung, 2022. "Mixed membership nearest neighbor model with feature difference," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 41(8), pages 1578-1594, December.
    9. Morton, Craig & Anable, Jillian & Yeboah, Godwin & Cottrill, Caitlin, 2018. "The spatial pattern of demand in the early market for electric vehicles: Evidence from the United Kingdom," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 119-130.
    10. Baltagi, Badi H. & Rokicki, Bartlomiej, 2014. "The spatial Polish wage curve with gender effects: Evidence from the Polish Labor Survey," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 36-47.
    11. Amin, A. & Choumert-Nkolo, J. & Combes, J.-L. & Combes Motel, P. & Kéré, E.N. & Ongono-Olinga, J.-G. & Schwartz, S., 2019. "Neighborhood effects in the Brazilian Amazônia: Protected areas and deforestation," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 272-288.
    12. Matteo Lippi Bruni & Irene Mammi, 2017. "Spatial effects in hospital expenditures: A district level analysis," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(S2), pages 63-77, September.
    13. Daniel Weimar & Claudio M. Rocha, 2019. "Does Distance Matter? Geographical Distance and Domestic Support for Mega Sports Events," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 20(2), pages 286-313, February.
    14. Mikolai, Júlia & Dorey, Peter & Keenan, Katherine & Kulu, Hill, 2023. "Spatial patterns of COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 mortality across waves of infection in England, Wales, and Scotland," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 338(C).
    15. Rodolfo Metulini & Paolo Sgrignoli & Stefano Schiavo & Massimo Riccaboni, 2018. "The network of migrants and international trade," Economia Politica: Journal of Analytical and Institutional Economics, Springer;Fondazione Edison, vol. 35(3), pages 763-787, December.
    16. Roger Bivand & Giovanni Millo & Gianfranco Piras, 2021. "A Review of Software for Spatial Econometrics in R," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 9(11), pages 1-40, June.
    17. Eric Nazindigouba KERE & Somlanare Romuald KINDA, 2016. "Climate Change and Food Security: Do Spatial Spillovers Matter?," Working Papers 201604, CERDI.
    18. Amy J. Schulz & Graciela B. Mentz & Natalie Sampson & Melanie Ward & J. Timothy Dvonch & Ricardo De Majo & Barbara A. Israel & Angela G. Reyes & Donele Wilkins, 2018. "Independent and Joint Contributions of Fine Particulate Matter Exposure and Population Vulnerability to Mortality in the Detroit Metropolitan Area," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 15(6), pages 1-15, June.
    19. Magaly Faride Herrera Giraldo & Carlos Giovanni González Espitia & Héctor Ochoa Díaz, 2023. "The spatial and economic relationship between labour informality and homicides in Cali, Colombia," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 41(5), September.
    20. Shanaka Herath & Johanna Choumert & Gunther Maier, 2015. "The value of the greenbelt in Vienna: a spatial hedonic analysis," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 54(2), pages 349-374, March.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:16:y:2019:i:17:p:3079-:d:260659. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.