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Because fossil fuel combustion is the principal cause of both the greenhouse gases that drive climate change and of air pollution, we are working across all of our projects in the Observatory, including our air pollution studies, our plastics studies, and our studies on chemical policy, to develop solutions that will reduce both of these threats and thus produce a double benefit for public health. 

Projects & Partnerships

With colleagues in the ÂÒÂ×С¿É°® School of Social Work, the ÂÒÂ×С¿É°® Department of Earth & Environmental Science, and the India Foundation for Ecological Security, we recently submitted a major grant proposal to the National Institutes of Health on Climate Change and Health with a focus on characterizing, quantifying and mitigating the mental health consequences of climate change in India. 

Initiatives

• Track the uptake of renewable energy – solar, wind, tidal and geothermal - in Massachusetts and across New England. 
• Continue to evaluate the hazards of natural gas to human health and to the environment, while blocking expansion of the natural gas infrastructure wherever possible. 
• Track the uptake and evaluate the health hazards of proposed gas substitutes such as biogas and hydrogen. 

• Examine the intersections between automotive air pollution along New England’s interstate highways and social injustice.
• In 2027, undertake a 5-year update of our 2022 study of the burden of disease and death due to climate-driven air pollution in the cities and towns of Massachusetts.

Goals

• Work with the UN Environment Programme and other partners to shape development of the Global Plastics Treaty, currently in negotiation under the auspices of the United Nations. Our overarching goal is to make the Treaty protective of health and of human rights.
• Develop a major report with support from the Minderoo Foundation and the Centre Scientifique de Monaco on plastics’ impacts on children’s health.
• Expand our economic analyses of the cost of disease and premature death caused by plastics across the plastic life cycle.

Goals

• Develop a major white paper for publication in a top-line journal on the need for fundamental reform of chemical policy in the United States and internationally to better protect human health.
• Examine pesticide use and health hazards in Massachusetts.
• Examine environmental pollution and health impacts in New England of per- and polyfluorinated substances (PFAS).