EDF partnered with Kaiser Permanente to combine data from our original study with the electronic health records of 41,000 people in Oakland to better understand just how much place matters in driving health disparities.
Making the Invisible Visible: A guide for mapping hyperlocal air pollution to drive clean air action offers information and best practices that can help leaders better understand their city’s quality challenges, how neighborhood-level monitoring can help illuminate them and how to develop a plan to significantly reduce pollution.
Our researchers found nitrogen dioxide (NO2) above the typical citywide levels outside nearly half (46%) of the schools and childcare centers in the areas we monitored. This kind of exposure to nitrogen oxides among children (NO and NO2) can result in the development and exacerbations of asthma and bronchitis.
Analysts use a variety of methods, depending on budget, capacity and existing data sources–to pinpoint the sources of pollution. For example, so-called source-based approaches start at the point from where air pollution is flowing and follow emissions as they mix, react, disperse and move through the atmosphere.
