Cooking with natural gas poses health risks, but new research shows the risks are not evenly distributed.
Scientists from Stanford University, Harvard University and the Central California Asthma Collaborative found that poorer Americans and racial and ethnic minority groups are disproportionately exposed to harmful gas furnace pollutants.
Previous studies have shown that gas furnaces emit nitrogen dioxide and carbon monoxide — pollutants that can cause respiratory problems — at levels considered unsafe by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the World Health Organization.new discovery now scientific progress Be the first to measure gas stove nitrogen dioxide (NO2) pollution by household type, ethnicity, income and cooking habits, and then calculate the cost of preventable childhood asthma cases.
To conduct the study, researchers built a model that combined the federal indoor air quality model to estimate gas furnace nitrogen dioxide concentrations. Field measurement data collected from over 100 homes The five U.S. states vary in size. They then applied the model to 7,632 homes with gas, propane and hybrid-fuel stoves included in the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s 2020 Residential Consumption Survey. They estimated the intensity of nitrogen dioxide exposure after dividing the homes into 24 different groups based on floor plans ranging from studio apartments to multi-bedroom homes.
Researchers found that American Indian and Alaska Native households faced the longest exposure to nitrogen dioxide, with levels 60 percent higher than the national average. Black, Hispanic and Latino households followed, experiencing a risk that was 20% higher than average. According to the World Health Organization, cookstoves alone expose these groups to more nitrogen dioxide pollution than is safe.
The study found that households with annual incomes of less than $10,000 were twice as likely to be contaminated by gas stoves as households with annual incomes of more than $150,000. Differences based on race and income are driven in part by differences in home size. However, the scientists note that other relevant factors may not have been measured in their model, including social differences in cooking behavior, ventilation and indoor time.
The researchers also used established epidemiological relationships to estimate that gas and propane stoves are responsible for up to 19,000 adult deaths in the United States each year, as well as 200,000 childhood asthma cases and $1 billion in costs to society.
“Most of us spend 90 percent or more of our time indoors,” said Rob Jackson, professor of earth system science at Stanford’s Doerr School of Sustainability and the study’s lead researcher. “We need to take action to clean people’s air because it’s the air most people breathe and we’ve been neglecting it for decades.”
Anne Caffolo, climate justice campaign manager for We Act Environmental Justice in Manhattan, said the findings are consistent with what the group has observed in studies of gas furnace contamination in public housing in New York City. People of color and low-income people are more likely to live in smaller, older apartments with poor ventilation, ineffective or broken range hoods and outdated appliances that leak more natural gas, she said.
“This is a gross injustice, which is why asthma rates are so much higher in communities of color and low-income communities,” Caforo said. She added that the new study “allows us to have more leverage to call for interventions, programs and policies that target low-income families first.”
The study’s authors say removing gas and propane furnaces is the best solution for individuals. Those who can’t afford an immediate replacement or are renters can buy portable induction burners, use air filters, open windows when cooking, and use range hoods to circulate kitchen air outside. But they also acknowledge that cost can be a barrier.
While tax credits in the Inflation Cutting Act could help lower the price of electric furnaces, researchers say stricter regulations are needed to help homes replace gas and avoid using natural gas in new construction. Still, the gas stove ban sparked a culture war in the United States.
“Our biggest problem is that this whole situation is politically unrealistic,” said Kevin D. Hamilton, a registered respiratory therapist and senior director of government affairs for the Central California Asthma Partnership. “All we can do is hope that researchers provide as much hard data as possible to keep the conversation sane.”
