Burning of fossil fuels releases large quantities of greenhouse gases that impact global climate. Here we determine the effect of air pollution from fossil fuels on global public health. For this, we use GEOS-Chem and an updated risk assessment model developed by epidemiologists at Harvard to calculate premature mortality due to exposure to air pollution from fossil fuels.

People: Eloise Marais (UCL), Karn Vohra (U. Birmingham)

Media Coverage:

Extensive Social and Traditional Media coverage summarized by Altmetrics

The Guardian, 'Invisible killer': fossil fuels caused 8.7m deaths globally in 2018, research finds

The Times, Pollution from fossil fuels twice as deadly as thought, scientists warn

Reuters, Fossil fuel pollution causes one in five premature deaths globally: study

Forbes, Fossil fuel pollution caused nearly 1-in-5 global deaths in 2018 groundbreaking study suggests

New Scientist, Deaths from fossil fuel air pollution are double what we thought

External Collaborators: Loretta Mickley, Joel Schwartz, and Melissa Sulprizio at Harvard and Alina Vodonos now at K Health.

New Datasets: Global premature mortality due to exposure to air pollution from fossil fuel combustion. [Link to Data]

Reference:

K. Vohra, A. Vodonos, J. Schwartz, E. A. Marais, M. P. Sulprizio, L. J. Mickley, Global mortality from outdoor fine particle pollution generated by fossil fuel combustion: Results from GEOS-Chem, Environ. Res., 195, 110754, doi:10.1016/j.envres.2021.110754. [Link to article]. [Pre-proof PDF]. [Final version]