Public Health Impact and Economic Costs of Volkswagen’s Lack of Compliance with the United States’ Emission Standards

Lifang Hou, Kai Zhang, Moira A. Luthin and Andrea A. Baccarelli
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Lifang Hou: Department of Preventive Medicine and the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center, Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL 60611, USA
Kai Zhang: Department of Epidemiology, Human Genetics and Environmental Sciences, University of Texas School of Public Health, Houston, TX 77030, USA
Moira A. Luthin: Department of Environmental Health, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA 02115, USA
Andrea A. Baccarelli: Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, New York, NY 10032, USA

IJERPH, 2016, vol. 13, issue 9, 1-6

Abstract: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently issued a notice of violation against Volkswagen (VW) for installing a defective device in certain models of diesel cars to circumvent emission tests for nitrogen oxides (NO x ). We quantified the health and economic impacts of extra NO x emissions attributable to non-compliant vehicles in the U.S. using the EPA’s Co-Benefits Risk Assessment model. We estimated that the total extra NO x emitted over one year of operation would result in 5 to 50 premature deaths, 687 to 17,526 work days with restricted activity, and economic costs of $43,479,189 to $423,268,502, based on various assumptions regarding emission scenarios and risks. This study highlights the potential impacts of VW vehicles’ lack of compliance on the health and well-being of the U.S. population.

Keywords: nitrogen oxides; risk assessment; vehicle emissions (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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