Health co-benefits of climate change mitigation depend on strategic power plant retirements and pollution controls

Dan Tong, Guannan Geng, Qiang Zhang (), Jing Cheng, Xinying Qin, Chaopeng Hong, Kebin He and Steven J. Davis ()
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Dan Tong: Tsinghua University
Guannan Geng: Tsinghua University
Qiang Zhang: Tsinghua University
Jing Cheng: Tsinghua University
Xinying Qin: Tsinghua University
Chaopeng Hong: University of California, Irvine
Kebin He: Tsinghua University
Steven J. Davis: University of California, Irvine

Nature Climate Change, 2021, vol. 11, issue 12, 1077-1083

Abstract: Abstract Reducing CO2 emissions from fossil fuel- and biomass-fired power plants often also reduces air pollution, benefitting both climate and public health. Here, we examine the relationship of climate and health benefits by modelling individual electricity-generating units worldwide across a range of climate–energy policy scenarios. We estimate that ~92% of deaths related to power plant emissions during 2010–2018 occurred in low-income or emerging economies such as China, India and countries in Southeast Asia, and show that such deaths are quite sensitive to future climate–energy trajectories. Yet, minimizing future deaths will also require strategic retirements of super-polluting power plants and deployment of pollution control technologies. These findings underscore the importance of considering public health in designing and implementing climate–energy policies: improved air quality and avoided air pollution deaths are not an automatic and fixed co-benefit of climate mitigation.

Date: 2021
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DOI: 10.1038/s41558-021-01216-1

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