Principal Investigator: Jill Baumgartner
Co-investigators: James J. Schauer, Xudong Yang, Christine Wiedinmyer, Majid Ezzati, Stella Daskalopoulo
Billions of people cook and heat their homes with highly polluting solid fuel stoves that negatively impact human health and the environment. Our group is developing innovative measurements and methods to quantify the benefits of a novel energy intervention package on air quality, climate change mitigation and cardiovascular health. In over 200 rural homes in the eastern Tibetan Plateau, we are measuring the reduction in air pollution emissions and exposures as well as the cardiovascular benefits of replacing traditional fuels and stoves with low-emission gasifier technologies and processed biomass fuel. We are also applying these emissions measurements to regional climate models to predict the climate mitigation benefits of a larger intervention program. This project addresses a major environmental risk -- household air pollution from solid fuel use -- which is the 4th leading contributor to the global burden of disease. Our findings will be disseminated to policy makers and other relevant environmental and public health groups in China and globally.