The economic benefits of fulfilling the World Health Organization's limits for particulates: A case study in Algeciras Bay (Spain)

Monetary Health Co-Benefits and GHG Emissions Reduction Benefits: Contribution from Private On-the-Road Transport

This is the first study to provide a systematic monetary benefit matrix, including greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction benefits and air pollution reduction health co-benefits, for a change in on-the-road transport to low-carbon types. The benefit transfer method is employed to estimate the social cost of carbon and the health co-benefits via impact pathway analysis in Taiwan. Specifically, the total emissions reduction benefits from changing all internal combustion vehicles to either hybrid electric vehicles, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, or electric vehicles would generate an average of USD 760 million from GHG emissions reduction and USD 2091 million from health co-benefits based on air pollution reduction, for a total benefit of USD 2851 million annually. For a change from combustion scooters to light- or heavy-duty electric scooters, the average GHG emissions reduction benefits would be USD 96.02 million, and the health co-benefits from air pollution reduction would be USD 1008.83 million, for total benefits of USD 1104.85 million annually.

Benefit Analysis of the 1st Spanish Air Pollution Control Programme on Health Impacts and Associated Externalities

This paper aims to provide scientific support for decision-making in the field of improving air quality by evaluating pollution reduction measures included in the current Spanish policy framework of the 1st National Air Pollution Control Programme (NAPCP). First, the health impacts of air quality are estimated by using the concentrations estimated by multiscale air quality modeling and the recommended concentration–response functions (CRF), specifically as a result of exposure to particulate matter (PM), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and ozone (O3). Second, the associated external costs are calculated by monetization techniques. Two scenarios are analyzed: a package including existing measures (WM2030) and a package with additional measures (WAM2030). Compared with the baseline scenario, an improvement was found in the health effects of NO2, PM10, and PM2.5, while for O3 there was a slight worsening, mainly due to the increase in the O3 metric used (SOMO35), which increases over some urban areas. Despite this, the monetary valuation of the total effects on health as a whole shows external benefits due to the adoption of measures (WM2030), compared with the reference scenario (no measures) of more than € 17.5 billion and, when considering the additional measures (WAM2030), benefits of about € 58.1 billion.

Health and Heating in the City of Temuco (Chile). Monetary Savings of Replacing Biomass with PV System in the Residential Sector

The paper conducts a comprehensive analysis of replacing residential use of wood burning stoves for heating with photovoltaic systems for the generation of electricity using storage batteries (PV + storage systems). The research focuses on the city of Temuco (Southern Chile) as a case study, since this city has a high use of firewood for heating (80% of households) and also because this city has been declared by authorities as an area saturated with suspended particles. The total cost corresponds to the acquisition of systems. The reduction of monetary value of the impact of polluting emissions, resulting from the combustion of firewood, on health and traffic accidents is calculated. The interactive tool GDB Compare has been used to calculate the impact of pollution on health both in terms of attributable deaths and disability-adjusted life years. The monetary value of the impact on health has been calculated using two alternative approaches: the value of statistical life and the human capital approach. To identify firewood use requirements, heating degree–days has been used for temperatures ≤15 °C and ≤18 °C. The emissions avoided calculations have been refined, including emissions associated with the manufacture and transport of systems through the life cycle analysis. For all scenarios, the main results show that the savings outweigh the costs.