By Debolina Banerjee, Katrina Peterson & Howard Greenwich
The hidden costs of the fossil fuel industry in the U.S. and around the world are staggering - and more so for people of color. While we associate fossil fuel costs with our utility bills and a tank full of gas, we also pay for fossil fuels with our health, our safety, our democracy, and our children’s right to a clean and healthy future. Study after study shows that these costs disproportionately fall upon people of color and low-income communities. I-1631 is our opportunity to hold the fossil fuel industry accountable for these hidden costs.
Costs to public health and our environment often make the news, but other costs are particularly hidden from view. With a history of funding violence in Africa, dodging costly clean-up of toxic spills in Central America, and exacerbating poverty in Africa and South America, the fossil fuel industry extracts from and further impoverishes the Global South without regard for the cost to human life and environmental health. This strategy is paralleled by a massive misinformation campaign in the United States to control the narrative about climate change, denying scientific proof of human-caused climate change and corroding citizen belief that climate change is real and that fossil fuel use contributes to climate change, a reality which will radically transform life on Earth as we know it. The fossil fuel industry employs these strategies to maintain control of the energy sector, benefit from generous subsidies from the US government, and generate enormous profits.
When we add up the total cost of fossil fuel production and use, a pattern of harm emerges to people of color throughout the globe. I-1631 gives us the opportunity to stop paying with our health, our lives, our humanity, and our children’s futures. By reducing our dependence on fossil fuels, transitioning us to cleaner forms of energy, and cleaning up pollution, I-1631 is the first practical step towards cleaning our air and water, increasing community resilience, and leaving a healthy planet for all children.
The true cost of fossil fuel use is far greater when we include the price we pay in health, safety, and the environment.
Use of fossil fuels for energy comes at a much higher economic cost than just what we pay for gas and electricity. It creates pervasive environmental degradation, air pollution, toxic emissions from industries, and increasing extreme weather events like wildfires, hurricanes, and floods that can be directly attributed to the rising temperature of the earth.1 For example, coal burning for electricity produces a legion of health and ecological impacts that is borne by the general public. A full accounting of the damage caused by the mining, production, transportation, burning, and waste disposal required for coal-based electricity doubles or triples the costs we pay in our gas and electric bills.2
Looking at all sources, The National Academy of Sciences estimates that the hidden costs of damages from energy production and use in the U.S. exceeds $120 billion a year, not including climate change and ecological impacts.3 Topping the list are coal-fired plants ($62 billion) and natural gas plants ($740 million), followed closely by highway vehicles ($56 billion in health and other non-climate damages). Another study shows that between 2002 and 2011, the social, environmental and health damage costs from emissions associated with electric power generation, oil and gas extraction, coal mining, and oil refineries associated was $131 billion dollars.
From another angle, we also see the damage costs from fossil fuels drop with better and stronger environmental regulations.4 Assigning monetary value to health and environmental burdens and damage from electricity generation, scientists concluded that the external costs from fossil fuels are significantly higher for fossil fuels than for renewable sources.5
The fossil fuel industry has funded violence, exacerbated poverty, and shortened lives throughout the Global South6 (broadly the low-income and marginalized regions of the world).
In the last twenty years, the environmental justice movement has begun to draw direct connections between welfare of communities of color in the U.S. and post-colonial nations where transnational oil and gas corporations (TNCs) continue to extract energy resources. TNCs have been found to perpetuate a lethal combination of destruction, harm, and crime in Africa and Central and South America in pursuit of resources. In oil-rich countries specifically, (TNCs) have acted like rogue paramilitary agencies, infiltrating and destabilizing these countries.
In Africa, oil exploration and resulting conflicts in Sudan7 and Nigeria8 have led to decades of poverty, malnourishment, and an acute health and existential crisis in these countries. Author Adrian Parr argues in her book ‘the Wrath of Capital’, that the root cause of the Sudanese civil war was inequitable distribution of the costs and benefits of oil production. The extraction of oil forced indigenous communities, who depended on the land for their livelihood, out of their own lands.9 The war resulted in acute poverty, approximately 2 million deaths, the displacement of 4 million people, and 420,000 refugees.10
In Nigeria, a country where oil and gas account for over 80% of the nation’s wealth, oil extraction and related exploitation is widespread, aided by state policies that strip indigenous people of their rights to these natural resources.11 Oil operations have devastated farming communities, depriving them of their land, livelihood, and health. They did not receive an appropriate compensation for this scale of devastation, but instead were (and continue to be) subject to the effects of oil on their lands. Their protests were quashed by mercenaries which are funded and operated by the oil and gas transnational companies.12
Finally, the Western Amazon regions - some of the most biodiverse in the world - and the indigenous tribes who call them home, have been exploited by fossil fuel extraction. In Peru, oil companies utilized a loophole in a law meant to protect isolated indigenous tribes to extract oil from territories in which these tribes have lived for centuries. This exploitation has profoundly and permanently threatened their way of life and health.13 In Ecuador, communities have been fighting a long legal battle with Texaco (since acquired by Chevron) which dumped about 2 billion gallons of crude oil waste over 28 years. Ecuador’s communities have borne the brunt of this toxic waste for decades and charge that14 that Chevron has evaded accountability using their financial and legal power.15
The fossil fuel industry has left low income communities and communities of color in the United States and abroad with toxic water, air, and soil, disproportionately impacting their long-term health and wealth.
Whether in the US or across the world, the fossil fuel industry has abandoned communities of color during and after extraction, assuming no responsibility for the impacts their operations and fossil fuel emissions cause. These communities are left with the burden of cleaning up and living amidst toxic soil, air, and water; the toxic pollution traps them in the vicious cycle of poverty and loss of health.
As described above, communities in Ecuador have been fighting to hold Chevron accountable for oil spills and clean up on their indigenous lands.16 17 Locally, communities in Pasco, WA bore the costs of cleanup after gasoline leaked from a pipeline connected to Chevron and contaminated their groundwater.18 In this case, the common thread of harm is Chevron and its associated operations, but the same narrative cuts across all of the TNCs.
In the US, scientists have proved that major fossil fuel companies like ExxonMobil, BP, Royal Dutch Shell, ConocoPhillips, Peabody Energy, CONSOL Energy, and Arch Coal are substantial contributors to the total historical emissions driving disruptive climate change.19 They are also responsible for undermining the health of people of color extensively in the U.S. For example, in Washington, people of color and low-income people are disproportionately exposed to fossil fuel pollution.20 Similarly, in California, major greenhouse gas and particulate matter emitting facilities are located in communities of color. 21 This disproportionate exposure to air pollution exacerbates the pre-existing health conditions and poverty in these neighborhoods. In Seattle, Georgetown and South Park neighborhoods have historically born this burden. These neighborhoods have some of the worst measures of air pollution, exposure to contaminated sites, and lack of access to healthy built environment. Residents have an average life expectancy of 8 years lower than the Seattle average.22
Air pollution, one of the major outcomes of fossil fuel use (especially transportation emissions23) and industrial energy use, is a major contributor to asthma and respiratory disease. But the burden of asthma and other respiratory diseases are disproportionately high for people of color, especially for people with preexisting respiratory diseases. According to 2014 and 2015 data24 from the US Department of Health and Human Services, African American women were 20% more likely to have asthma than whites. In 2015, African American children were “10 times more likely” to die from asthma related causes than the white population; African American adults were almost “3 times more likely” to die.
In Washington state, medical researchers estimate that at least 1/3rd of all Washingtonians have a medical condition exacerbated by vehicular air pollution. In 2009, Washington State Department of Ecology estimated that each year around 5,700 WA residents suffer premature deaths, non-fatal heart attacks, acute bronchitis and asthma due to fossil fuel air pollution.25 In 2010, data revealed that Washington state hospitals charged $73 million for asthma-related hospitalizations. $4.8 of this $73 million was charged to patients themselves. In the same year, work-related asthma cost Washington state approximately $300,000.26
But, severe health inequity based on race and class exists here as well.27 In Washington State, whites have longer life expectancies than all other races: Hispanic adults have a shorter life-expectancy than whites by 12 years, Blacks by 10 years, and Asian/Pacific Islanders by 3 years.28 American Indian/Alaskan Natives and African Americans have a significantly higher prevalence of asthma as well as death rates (about 75 per year) from asthma than non-Hispanic whites, especially for urban areas.29 In 2010, Washington State lost 4.3 million person-days of productivity as 22% of working adults missed work due to asthma. For a working member in a low-income family, missing work could mean losing earnings, especially if the person gets paid on a daily or hourly basis. This is extremely hard for such families.30 31 32 The American Lung Association data for 2017 found Washington State counties to score very poorly on health outcomes due to pollution from fossil fuels, with Yakima, Snohomish, Pierce, and Clark counties scoring the poorest grades.33
In Southern California, multiple studies have revealed the inequity and injustice of urban air pollution not only to adults and children but also on fetuses. In a recent study, researchers found that the mean particulate matter (pollutant) exposure from diesel trucks was 38% higher for minorities than for whites, leading to an approximate 14 days of life lost per individual, collectively around 370,000 years of lost life expectancy in total for the 9.8 million minority individuals in the study area.34 Another research group recently concluded that when pregnant women are exposed to particulate pollutants, the thyroid gland of the unborn fetus is highly affected and after birth, the baby is susceptible to developing chronic thyroid problems.35 If a pregnant woman sustains long hours of pollution exposure, as in the case of neighborhoods with high pollution exposure, her baby is highly likely to be born with pre-existing health conditions.
The correlation between environmental exposures, proximity to waste landfills, likelihood of contamination and serious diseases, has been well established.36 For neighborhoods already stressed with toxic soil and poor health and economic outcomes, any exposure to fossil fuel pollution exacerbates the condition.
People of color, low-income people, and fossil fuel workers are disproportionately impacted by fossil fuel spills, explosions, and industrial accidents.
Whether due to geographic proximity or employment in the fossil fuel industry, communities of color and low-income communities experience the highest rates of fossil fuel-related accidents, often left without support to deal with the aftermath. Globally, some of the largest spills have occurred in offshore drilling sites and transport of oil.37 This puts the lives of fossil fuel workers on those drilling sites, the drivers of the vehicles transporting oil, as well as the residents on sites where the incident occurs, at great risk. Some of the best examples are the 2010 Deepwater Horizon drilling rig explosion where 11 workers lost their lives,38 and the 2016 incident in Columbia River, OR where the derailment of an oil train resulted in oil spills and explosion.39 Until the situation was contained, the incident threatened the 430 residents of the town of Mosier, OR and the local flora and fauna.
In the United States, low-income communities of color are the most likely to be located near industrial and contaminated sites. As a result, they are disproportionately impacted by the operation of these sites, and are at most risk in the event of an industrial incident. Owing to their lower income, these communities also have lower political power to resist environmental externalities.40 In California, facilities causing emissions were found to be disproportionately located near or in people of color neighborhoods.41 42 Similarly, researchers in Florida found that race, ethnicity, and other socio-economic indicators are significant predictors of Superfund site locations, where majority of residents are Black and Brown low-income working-class people.43 Scientists have also proved that such proximity to industrial facilities, landfills, or other contaminated sites run the high risk of further contamination should an incident occur.
Workers of color and blue-collar workers also experience higher rates of occupational injuries and diseases, primarily in mining, steel, chemical, and other industries.44 According to the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, in 2017, there were 429 reported incidents45 in offshore drilling sites, including fires, explosions, fatalities, spills, and collisions. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated the total percentage of fatally injured workers in oil and gas extraction industries to be 71% of the total fatal work injuries in mining, quarrying, oil and gas. The rate was disproportionately high, around 48%, for contract workers employed in the construction and extraction sectors.46 The high risk that refinery workers face was highlighted most recently after 15 workers were killed in an explosion in a BP refinery facility in Texas. The explosion injured 180 others and resulted in a total loss of more than $1.5 billion. After an investigation and follow-up studies on the safety of 71 refineries in the US, researchers found that “there remains an alarming potential for future disasters” and that "refineries are not sufficiently prepared for emergencies”.47
Washington State workers and communities have not been immune to this phenomenon. In 2010, an explosion in Tesoro’s refinery in Anacortes killed 7 workers.48 49 Chevron and its related operations are responsible for multiple leaks in central and eastern Washington, where pipelines have leaked oil into local aquifers, contaminating groundwater.50 51 Similarly, BP has regularly spilled and dumped oil in Cherry Point, WA, with no accountability (sometimes not even reporting the spills), risking workers and residents and leaving them with the burden of cleanup and health costs.52
Fossil fuel companies have funded misinformation campaigns in order to control the narrative about climate change, ensure continued political support for and subsidization of fossil fuel production, and thereby continued profits.
Fossil fuel and energy companies like ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, Valero Energy, Tesoro, and Occidental,53 devote large amounts of funding to promote fossil fuel use and dependence, ensure profits, and spread misinformation about climate science. They sway public opinion and influence politicians by making public statements, donating to political campaigns, lobbying54 elected officials, legislative bodies and agencies, paying for editorial-style advertisements,55 and funding trade groups and think tanks like American Enterprise Institute and Hoover Institution, all to influence legislation and policy-making in their favor.56 Researchers estimate that between 2000 and 2016, around 17% ($370.44 million) of total US lobbying expenditures were by fossil fuel industries and 26.5% ($554.43 million) were by electrical utilities, most of whom used coal-based source for energy generation.57
Fossil fuel companies generate research with predetermined conclusions -- conducted by paid scientists who use flawed methodologies58 and skewed cost-benefit analyses -- in order to undermine the threat and urgency of climate change and conceal the risks of fossil fuel.59 They then use this misinformation to counter established climate science and spread misinformation amongst the general public, confusing the conversation about climate science when the scientific community is in consensus about the reality of human-driven climate change, caused by our use of fossil fuels. Researchers have revealed that the Koch Affiliated Foundations and ExxonMobil Foundation heavily funded climate change counter movements until 2007.60 However, in 2008, they moved their ‘traceable’ funding to small pass-through funding to climate-change-counter movements through donor directed philanthropies like Donors Trust/Capital.61 They allegedly did this to conceal their financial influence and ties to fossil fuel companies.
Currently, fossil fuel combustion receives approximately $5.3 trillion a year in subsidies globally, through ‘avoided costs’ to public health and the environment with their operations and use.62 Multinational banks have also been supporting the fossil fuel industry for decades. In 2017, financing of extreme fossil fuels went up to $115 billion from $104 million in 2016, instead of ceasing financing expansion as required by the temperature goals of the Paris Climate Agreement.63 But researchers have concluded that a redirection of such policies from subsidies for fossil fuels to carbon pricing could generate revenues that can cover a huge portion of public financing needs for countries to meet their Sustainable Development Goals.64 65
Transitioning to a clean energy economy will reduce fossil fuel pollution and environmental harm to communities of color, produce better health outcomes for all, and help us address climate change.
Reducing air pollution has been proven to create trillions of dollars in savings in health care costs, both for society and for families.66 Time and again health-scientists and economists have concluded that the cost to human health of fossil fuel use is enormous, from shortened lives to an economic burden on people affected by pollution. They also show that the impact falls disproportionately on people of color, women, and children. Families with a member being treated for asthma face average medical expenses of $3,266 per year, including office visits, medications, and emergency room visits.67 While this average cost is split between insurers, charity care, and out-of-pocket income, it does not include time lost at work or school, which hurts workers who earn hourly wages the most.
The Lancet Commission on Health and Climate Change, a group of international representatives with multidisciplinary expertise, has marked climate change impacts as the “greatest global health opportunity of the 21st century,” arguing that a decarbonized global economy can secure public health benefits.68 Amongst their key recommendations, they listed renewable energy as a pathway to health equity that can provide a reliable source of electricity for low-income communities and health facilities. They predicted that moving away from fossil fuels to clean energy and bringing down global greenhouse gas emissions would also help reduce 2.2 million premature deaths globally, by 2100.69
Furthermore, communities could benefit from switching global policies that subsidize fossil fuels to policies that put a price on carbon emissions and transition to clean energy. This would help us meet global greenhouse gas reduction targets, as well as create domestic public revenues that could be invested in sustainable development, health-care, education and infrastructure for clean energy, transportation or clean water.70 71
Just like Washington state, the state of Massachusetts has also been considering a fee on carbon. They calculated that their proposed carbon fee-and-rebate policy would save 340 lives from respiratory and cardiovascular conditions, and yield a cumulative $2.9 billion in health benefits by 2040. The revenue from the fee would be allocated to offset costs for low income and rural populations, renewable energy, green infrastructure, and resiliency efforts.72 73
In the US, researchers estimated that clean energy initiatives like the Clean Power Plan and US Department of Energy’s SunShot Initiative could reduce pollution by 32% from 2005 levels.74 This could help save 3,600 lives per year, a total of 59,000 lives and approximately $167 billion75 in health costs by 2050. Researchers from the International Monetary Fund calculated that placement of a nationally appropriate price on carbon, countries would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20%, raise GDP 3%, and raise $3 trillion per year in revenue globally, thereby bringing overall “benefit to populations now” by investing in clean energy.76
Conclusion
The benefits to communities of color and low-income people in transitioning from fossil fuel use to clean energy go far beyond preserving our environment for future generations.
Exploitation, harm, and risk to communities of color have been at the heart of extracting and burning of fossil fuels for decades. I-1631 is a bold step towards an equitable climate action. It invests in building resilience in communities and neighborhoods which are historically burdened with poor health and economic outcomes owing to disproportionate exposure to pollution. Representatives from these frontline communities would have a say in how the funds are allocated reinforcing accountability in the policy. I-1631 will reduce pollution at its source, address urgent climate risks, prioritize frontline communities and benefit every Washingtonian. Our collective decision in November 2018 will help us move towards cleaning our air and water and leaving a healthier future for our children.
All references listed can be found here.