Denver's minority neighborhoods face higher air pollution levels - Environmental Health News
Denver's minority neighborhoods face higher air pollution levels - EHN
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Pieter van de Sande/ Unsplash
Denver's minority neighborhoods face higher air pollution levels
February 26, 2024
1 min read
A recent study highlights the disproportionate impact of air pollution on communities of color in Denver.
Sharon Udasin reports for The Hill.
In short:
- The study identifies Denver neighborhoods like Globeville, Argo, Elyria-Swansea, and Chaffee Park as the most polluted.
- It reveals a pattern of environmental inequality, with higher pollution levels in areas predominantly inhabited by minorities. Transportation infrastructure, like highways constructed through or near such communities, were among the pollution sources.
- This situation echoes historical redlining practices, now manifested in environmental terms.
Key quote:
“Every city has a story of why people live where they do, and that affects who is affected most by pollution."
— Alex Bradley, chemistry graduate student at the University of Colorado Boulder
Why this matters:
It's not just about air quality; it's about how historical and systemic inequalities continue to impact health outcomes in minority communities. For example, redlining, a discriminatory policy from the 1930s, has led to a disproportionate concentration of oil and gas wells in neighborhoods that were redlined-- making this a climate justice issue.
Related Knowledge Center: Air emissions
More than 30 years after the last major update of the Clean Air Act, the U.S. Supreme Court has upended the ability of Congress to give the Environmental Protection Agency and other federal agencies broad scope to combat air pollution, including the emission of greenhouse gases. Meanwhile, further Biden administration efforts to limit emissions face opposition in the courts.