Do Waste Incinerators Induce Adverse Respiratory Effects? An Air Quality and Epidemiological Study of Six Communities

Abstract

The purpose of the study presented here was to simultaneously measure air quality and respiratory function and symptoms in populations living in the neighborhood of waste incinerators and to estimate the contribution of incinerator emissions to the particulate air mass in these neighborhoods. We studied the residents of three communities having, respectively, a biomedical and a municipal incinerator, and a liquid hazardous waste-burning industrial furnace. We compared results with three matched-comparison communities. We did not detect differences in concentrations of particulate matter among any of the three pairs of study communities. Average fine particulate (PM 2.5 ) concentrations measured for 35 days varied across study communities from 16 to 32 μg/m 3 . Within the same community, daily concentrations of fine particulates varied by as much as eightfold, from 10 to 80 μg/m 3 , and were nearly identical within each pair of communities. Direct measurements of air quality and estimates based on a chemical mass balance receptor model showed that incinerator emissions did not have a major or even a modest impact on routinely monitored air pollutants. A one-time baseline descriptive survey ( n = 6963) did not reveal consistent community differences in the prevalence of chronic or acute respiratory symptoms between incinerator and comparison communities, nor did we see a difference in baseline lung function tests or in the average peak expiratory flow rate measured over a period of 35 days. Based on this analysis of the first year of our study, we conclude that we have no evidence to reject the null hypothesis of no acute or chronic respiratory effects associated with residence in any of the three incinerator communities. Images Figure 1. Figure 2. Figure 3. Figure 4. Figure 4. Figure 4. Figure 5. Figure 5. Figure 5. Figure 6. Figure 7.

Waste Incineration and Pulmonary Function: An Epidemiologic Study of Six Communities

“…Details of the study design are presented elsewhere. 11 An overview of the study is shown in Figure 1.…”

“…11 The exposure could have been so low that it was unlikely to elicit any measurable effect on pulmonary function. However, the contribution of the incinerator to area fine mass was not estimated in the 3-or 12-month period preceding the annual spirometric tests, and contribution of other unmeasured pollutants from the emissions was not estimated.…”

Mortality and Morbidity in a Population Exposed to Emission from a Municipal Waste Incinerator. A Retrospective Cohort Study

“…Studies on incinerators in France and in Italy have suggested an increased risk of non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) [15], soft-tissue sarcoma [16,17], lung cancer [18], and neoplasia of the nervous system and liver [12]. Although the studies conducted by Shy et al [19] and Lee and Shy [20] did not show respiratory effects. Other studies have reported increases in respiratory diseases or symptoms in populations residing near incinerators [21,22,23,24] and in children [25,26].…”

Pulmonary functionality among workers of a Central Italy waste-to-energy plant: a retrospective study

“…The main lung effects investigated among workers are respiratory symptoms and pulmonary function [5–13]. In particular, the presence of functional respiratory alterations attributable to the current levels of exposure is controversial.…”