Climate change and health costs of air emissions from biofuels and gasoline
- 10 February 2009
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
- Vol. 106 (6), 2077-2082
- https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0812835106
Abstract
Environmental impacts of energy use can impose large costs on society. We quantify and monetize the life-cycle climate-change and health effects of greenhouse gas (GHG) and fine particulate matter (PM2.5) emissions from gasoline, corn ethanol, and cellulosic ethanol. For each billion ethanol-equivalent gallons of fuel produced and combusted in the US, the combined climate-change and health costs are $469 million for gasoline, $472–952 million for corn ethanol depending on biorefinery heat source (natural gas, corn stover, or coal) and technology, but only $123–208 million for cellulosic ethanol depending on feedstock (prairie biomass, Miscanthus, corn stover, or switchgrass). Moreover, a geographically explicit life-cycle analysis that tracks PM2.5 emissions and exposure relative to U.S. population shows regional shifts in health costs dependent on fuel production systems. Because cellulosic ethanol can offer health benefits from PM2.5 reduction that are of comparable importance to its climate-change benefits from GHG reduction, a shift from gasoline to cellulosic ethanol has greater advantages than previously recognized. These advantages are critically dependent on the source of land used to produce biomass for biofuels, on the magnitude of any indirect land use that may result, and on other as yet unmeasured environmental impacts of biofuels.This publication has 35 references indexed in Scilit:
- Coarse Particulate Matter Air Pollution and Hospital Admissions for Cardiovascular and Respiratory Diseases Among Medicare PatientsJAMA, 2008
- Exposure to Particulate Air Pollution and Risk of Deep Vein ThrombosisJAMA Internal Medicine, 2008
- The effect of CO 2 regulations on the cost of corn ethanol productionEnvironmental Research Letters, 2008
- Climate forcing from the transport sectorsProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2008
- Net energy of cellulosic ethanol from switchgrassProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2008
- Evaluating fuel ethanol feedstocks from energy policy perspectives: A comparative energy assessment of corn and corn stoverEnergy Policy, 2007
- Automobile Externalities and PoliciesSSRN Electronic Journal, 2007
- Motor Vehicle Contributions to Ambient PM10 and PM2.5 at Selected Urban Areas in the USAEnvironmental Monitoring and Assessment, 2006
- Environmental, economic, and energetic costs and benefits of biodiesel and ethanol biofuelsProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2006
- The marginal damage costs of carbon dioxide emissions: an assessment of the uncertaintiesEnergy Policy, 2005