Can natural gas save lives? Evidence from the deployment of a fuel delivery system in a developing country

Resul Cesur (), Erdal Tekin and Aydogan Ulker

Journal of Health Economics, 2018, vol. 59, issue C, 91-108

Abstract: There has been a widespread displacement of coal by natural gas as space heating and cooking technology in Turkey in the last two decades, triggered by the deployment of natural gas networks. We examine the impact of this development on mortality among adults and the elderly by exploiting the variation in the timing of the deployment and the intensity of expansion of gas networks across provinces using data from 2001 to 2016. The results indicate that the expansion of natural gas has caused significant reductions in mortality among both adults and the elderly. These findings are supported by our auxiliary analysis, which demonstrates that the expansion of natural gas networks might have led to a significant improvement in air quality. Furthermore, we show that the mortality gains are primarily driven by reductions in cardio-respiratory deaths, which are more likely to be due to conditions caused or exacerbated by air pollution.

Keywords: Mortality; Air pollution; Natural gas; Coal; Turkey; Fracking (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I10 I15 I18 O10 O13 Q42 Q48 Q53 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (17)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167629617306057
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
Working Paper: Can Natural Gas Save Lives? Evidence from the Deployment of a Fuel Delivery System in a Developing Country (2016)
Working Paper: Can Natural Gas Save Lives? Evidence from the Deployment of a Fuel Delivery System in a Developing Country (2016)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jhecon:v:59:y:2018:i:c:p:91-108

DOI: 10.1016/j.jhealeco.2018.03.001

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Health Economics is currently edited by J. P. Newhouse, A. J. Culyer, R. Frank, K. Claxton and T. McGuire

More articles in Journal of Health Economics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().