Australia’s first national level quantitative environmental justice assessment of industrial air pollution

Jayajit Chakraborty,Donna Green

doi:10.1088/1748-9326/9/4/044010

Abstract

This study presents the first national level quantitative environmental justice assessment of industrial air pollution in Australia. Specifically, our analysis links the spatial distribution of sites and emissions associated with industrial pollution sources derived from the National Pollution Inventory, to Indigenous status and social disadvantage characteristics of communities derived from Australian Bureau of Statistics indicators. Our results reveal a clear national pattern of environmental injustice based on the locations of industrial pollution sources, as well as volume, and toxicity of air pollution released at these locations. Communities with the highest number of polluting sites, emission volume, and toxicity-weighted air emissions indicate significantly greater proportions of Indigenous population and higher levels of socio-economic disadvantage. The quantities and toxicities of industrial air pollution are particularly higher in communities with the lowest levels of educational attainment and occupational status. These findings emphasize the need for more detailed analysis in specific regions and communities where socially disadvantaged groups are disproportionately impacted by industrial air pollution. Our empirical findings also underscore the growing necessity to incorporate environmental justice considerations in environmental planning and policy-making in Australia.

Highlights

The disproportionate distribution of environmental ‘goods’ and ‘bads’ in relation to the ethnic or socio-economic status of nearby communities has been well-established in the international literature through the use of an environmental justice framework, as previously noted in a special edition of this journal (Stephens 2007)
To provide a framework for this national level Australian assessment, we focus on the relationship between the extent of social disadvantage and four specific indicators of industrial air pollution
To determine how air pollution is related to social disadvantage data on National Pollutant Inventory (NPI) sites and their emission-related attributes were spatially aggregated to each of the 2110 Statistical Area Level 2 (SA2) areas representing our units of analysis

Summary

Introduction

The disproportionate distribution of environmental ‘goods’ and ‘bads’ in relation to the ethnic or socio-economic status of nearby communities has been well-established in the international literature through the use of an environmental justice framework, as previously noted in a special edition of this journal (Stephens 2007). The United Church of Christ’s Commission for Racial Justice (UCC 1987) provided the first comprehensive national level analysis of racial, ethnic and economic inequities in the distribution of environmental hazards in the US. Using zip-code level data, this study found the presence of commercial hazardous waste facilities and uncontrolled waste sites to be significantly associated with a higher percentage of the racial minority population, lower household income and lower housing values across the nation. These findings were investigated and confirmed by numerous studies that. Lett. 9 (2014) 044010 provided empirical support regarding the widespread practice of locating polluting industries in low-income and non-white neighborhoods (Bullard 1990, Bryant and Mohai 1992, Brown 1995, Mohai et al2009b, Schlosberg and Carruthers 2010)

Methods

Results

Conclusion