Pollution, extreme weather, and global warming have become increasingly important in today’s society. This dissertation examines these topics in three chapters, analyzing the effects of pollution and environmental factors on human behavior. The first chapter uses a dataset of unique daily crimes in the U.S. to unveil the relationship between weather/pollution and the crime rate for seven major U.S. cities. The results reveal that temperature significantly affects both violent and property crime rates. The rate of violent crime is lower on extreme and unpleasant weather days (i.e., when the temperature is above 99°F) in comparison to good or unremarkable days. There is little evidence on how air pollution affects the crime rate by using fine particulates (PM2.5) and coarse particulates (PM10). However, pollution does have an effect on crime if the area of analysis is located closer to an operated toxic release facility. The second chapter examines how weekly hours worked by individuals vary with respect to snowfall in 265 metropolitan areas (about 75% of the US workforce) over the years 2004-2014. The results reveal that working hours are significantly affected by snow events, with magnitudes varying by types of workers, types of employment (class of worker, occupation, and industry), and regions. Overall, each average daily inch of snowfall, during a Current Population Survey (CPS) monthly reference week, reduces working hours by about 1 hour. Snow storms reduce weekly hours worked considerably more among construction workers and in the South than elsewhere in the U.S.. We find little evidence that hours lost from large snowfalls are “made-up” in subsequent weeks. The third chapter investigates whether housing age, which has been missing in the conventional environmental justice literature, has an impact on the distribution of households in a pollution area. Income and race were believed to be predominant factors that affect the location choices of individuals. By controlling for this additional housing age variable in the conventional model, I examine which factor, income or race, is affected most. The results indicate that older houses are located closer to pollution sites. Additionally, once I control for the housing age, the marginal effect of income declines significantly, approximately by 50%. The effect on race was insignificant in empirical analysis.

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abstract: My dissertation combines the notion of residential sorting from Tiebout (1956) with Grossman’s (1972) concept of a health production function to develop a new empirical framework for investigating what individuals’ residential location choices reveal about their valuation of amenities, the welfare effects of climate change, the forces underlying environmental justice, and the value of a statistical life. Location choices are affected by age, health, and financial constraints, and by exposure to local amenities that affect people’s health and longevity. Chapter 1 previews how I formalize this idea and investigate its empirical implications in three interrelated essays. Chapter 2 investigates interactions between health, the environment, and income. Seniors tend to move at higher rates after being diagnosed with new chronic medical conditions. While seniors generally tend to move to locations with less polluted air, those who have been diagnosed with respiratory conditions move to relatively more polluted locations. This counterintuitive pattern is reconciled by documenting that new diagnoses bring about increases in medical expenditures, thereby limiting disposable income that can be spent on housing. Relatively cheaper places tend to be more polluted, and higher exposure to pollution leaves seniors more vulnerable to future health shocks. In Chapter 3, I combine information about housing prices with estimates of location-specific effects on mortality to estimate the Value of a Statistical Life (VSL) for seniors - one of the most important statistics used to evaluate policies affecting mortality. Since local amenities correlate with causal mortality effects, but also provide utility independently, the difficulty in controlling for local amenities implies that my VSL estimates are best interpreted as bounds. Chapter 4 builds a new structural framework for evaluating spatially heterogeneous changes to local amenities. I estimate a dynamic model of location choice with a sample of 5.5 million seniors from 2001-2013. Their average annual willingness-to-pay to avoid future climate change in the United States under a “business as usual” scenario ranges from $962 for older, sicker groups who are more vulnerable to climate change’s negative effects on health to -$1,894 for younger, healthier groups, who value warmer winters and are relatively resilient. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Economics 2020

In order to meet emissions targets under the UN Paris Agreement, every nation must decarbonize its energy production. The US isn't reducing energy-related emissions fast enough to meet its targets for keeping overall warming under 2°C above pre-industrial levels. This constitutes a grave injustice to the most vulnerable populations of the world, who are suffering the ill effects of climate change already. The challenge of eliminating fossil fuels from the US energy system is not simply one of technological limitations, however. The aim of this dissertation is to provide an analysis of historical, political, and, most importantly, conceptual barriers to decarbonization of energy in the US. I believe not just our policies and our markets, but our thinking has to change if we are to avoid recapitulating the injustices of the fossil fuel energy system. I argue that energy policy in the US over time has ossified around a narrow conception of energy as fossil energy—as a substance, rather than as a service. I call this the fossil conception of energy (FCE). I follow historical traces of the FCE in three key areas: political discourse in the US, the relationships between the US dollar and OPEC oil (a complex web called the petrodollar system), and domestic energy markets. Through William Freudenburg's "double diversion" framework for analysis of society-environment relationships, I argue that the FCE grounds a privileged discourse that legitimates the supremacy of fossil fuels and contributes to the maintenance of US hegemony worldwide. I propose that one possibility for rethinking energy may be found in systems thinking, which leads me to conclude that any energy system organized around capital will recapitulate many of the injustices of the fossil fuel system.

Outdoor recreation was established in Sweden about 100-150 years ago and its practices and organization were at that time dominated by a white male upper class. Today, Swedish outdoor recreation is guided by public policy, imploring for everyone’s equal value, and right to experience and be outdoors, regardless of age, color, or gender. Data from Statistics Sweden however show that persons born in Sweden are active in outdoor recreational activities to a higher degree than persons born outside Sweden. The data, undeniably, confirm that Swedish immigrants are taking part at a lower rate in outdoor recreation than those who are born in Sweden. Although the topic is relevant, there is still limited data about Swedish immigrants’ outdoor recreational patterns. This study thus aims to fill this research gap by exploring how perceptions of (in)justice emerge in Swedish immigrants’ outdoor recreational patterns and how it may influence their motivation to participate in outdoor recreation. The study employs the theoretical lens of Environmental Justice (EJ). Few studies have used EJ to analyze access to outdoor recreation. This approach, therefore, offers a unique way of analyzing (in)justice issues in the Swedish outdoor context. This is a qualitative study based on semi-structured interviews which were conducted with eighteen Swedish immigrants. A narrative analysis was employed as it allowed the researcher to explore perceived (in)justices experienced by Swedish immigrants and offers a way of investigating the lived experiences of individuals. The results of the study show that the outdoors is less accessible to immigrants due to a distributive injustice of benefits, lack of representation and recognition, and lack of just participation in decision-making processes These perceived injustices prevent Swedish immigrants from participating equally and fairly in the outdoors and influences their motivations to recreate.

As the Hispanic/Latino population grows in the United States, increased attention is being given to how and why Hispanic/Latino recreation differs from Anglo recreation. Concerns over equal access to natural resources and recreation have led researchers to question the causes for the differences in recreation choices. The discussion has largely focused on the restrictive effects of ethnicity and the marginal position of minorities in society creating recreation patterns in which minorities are practically nonexistent in wildland recreation areas. Stepping away from the negative valuation about dissimilarities in Hispanic/Latino versus Anglo recreation, this study of Hispanics/Latinos in Cache Valley, Utah focuses on recreation as defined by participants, recreation sites both visited and not visited, and the decision drivers participants identify as most influential. Through the use of a participant mapping activity, this study first identifies patterns in types of sites visited and not visited by participants. Using exploratory, semi-structured interviews, this study also uncovers the participants’definitions of recreation as well as important elements driving their recreation choices, including desired and undesired sites for recreation. Municipal recreation sites are visited most commonly by participants and the major drivers attracting their visitation are the physical site characteristics comprised of proximity to their residences, available facilities, suitability for family outings, scenery, a feeling of seclusion or relaxation, and activities specific to the site. Sites not visited span the categories of municipal, federal, state, and private. Federal sites are the most commonly desired and undesired types of sites not visited by participants. Non-visitation of sites was found to largely be the result of marginality characteristics such as a lack of money, time, knowledge, language, and fear. Ethnicity and custom also proved to be influential drivers of recreation decisions through elements like language and participant conceptualization of recreation as seeking spaces in which to gather with others. This study concludes that customs and powers of access (as related to ethnicity and marginality) intermingle to influence recreation choices among Hispanic/Latino participants. Looking at Hispanic/Latino recreation beyond its comparative Anglo differences provides a necessary holistic understanding of the elements driving this ethnic group’s decisions. As this understanding increases, work can be done to ensure equality in access to resources like recreation as desired by the minority population.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Environmentalism has incorrectly, historically been canonized as a primarily white, primarily male, led movement. This thesis argues that the history of the environmental movement has been whitewashed. Women of color have been the main arbiters of change as leaders in their community who organize against the environmental degradation that disproportionately affects communities of color. Change is implemented by these women through representation, grassroots organizing, and coalition but these strategies have been unrecognized and undervalued for decades. As the rate of environmental degradation rapidly increases, specifically affecting communities of color, the voices of women of color need to be recognized, elevated, and heeded in order to make an environmental movement that prioritizes justice and the importance of intersectional voices

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Kennecott copper mine is one of the largest producers of pollution in the United States: it has contaminated over 72 square miles in the Salt Lake Valley. In 1998 alone, Kennecott, which is located only 25 miles southwest of downtown Salt Lake City, released 439 million pounds of toxic material into the Salt Lake Valley. Kennecott was proposed as a Superfund site by the EPA in 1994. Today it is the largest manmade excavation in the world. When mining operations began in 1863 at what is now Kennecott, Salt Lake City was a small city of just over 8,000 (Census, 1860). In recent years, the city has expanded toward Kennecott, so that once distant hazards are now literally in Salt Lake City’s residents’ backyards. According to the basic patterns commonly identified in the academic literatures on environmental justice and urban growth, as the Salt Lake City metropolitan area grows towards Kennecott the assumptions would be (1) Kennecott’s mining activities would be severely hindered by the influence of the EPA or would be forced to close due to the proximity of residents. (2) Those living/moving nearest to the area would most likely be low income people with no other options. (3) Arousal of community opposition to Kennecott as residents continue to move closer, which in this paper is referred to as “reverse” NIMBYism. However, none of the assumptions are the case. Why is it that Kennecott continues to function at full capacity without direct influence by the EPA and those residents encroaching upon it are not of low income and are not in opposition? This study of social, urban and historical geography will address these questions by exploring the spatial, economic and political history of Kennecott, Salt Lake City and the EPA, with a focus on the recent and ongoing development of 20,000 new homes in the area called Daybreak. The analysis will draw on analytical and theoretical approaches common to geographical analyses of urban growth and sprawl, environmental perception and environmental justice in relation to the nexus of spatial, economic and political circumstances which have led to the development of a new housing area on previously polluted land.

Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) appear to be a cost-efficient means of food production, but the cost to human health and wellbeing is significant and often overlooked. More concerning still, CAFO hidden costs are often disproportionately absorbed by marginalized members of society who do not have the resources with which to fight back or to raise awareness. Therefore, we sought to gain a better understanding of how industrial animal agriculture might be disproportionately harming certain populations within the Appalachian region, in effort to bring awareness to these concerns. We narrowed our study to North Carolina, specifically, due to the large CAFO presence in the state. The terms “cafos”, "concentrated animal feeding operations", “factory farming", "industrial animal agriculture", "large-scale animal agriculture" and “North Carolina” were searched for on all EBSCO databases. Results were limited to peer reviewed academic journal materials with publication dates ranging from 2018 to 2023. Of the 22 articles that resulted, 6 were eliminated due to irrelevance to the topic at hand. The remaining materials included 11 studies, 2 law reviews, a human rights brief, a critical discourse analysis, and an article comparing CAFO regulations between states. Our review of this literature supported the fact that waste material from North Carolina hog and poultry CAFOs pollutes the air and waterways of nearby communities with hormones, antibacterial-resistant pathogens, hazardous fumes, and excess nutrients. Study findings evidenced a correlation between certain health conditions (uterine cancer, cardiovascular mortality, UTI ER visits, and gastrointestinal illness) and North Carolina CAFO exposure. The literature indicates that people living near CAFOs in North Carolina disproportionately belong to a minoritized race, are disproportionately poorer, and are less likely to have health insurance. Those who work for these CAFOs are at a further heightened risk, yet they are even less likely to have the resources or power to insist on proper protections. We found that current motoring and regulation of CAFOs in North Carolina are regarded as insufficient to protect human health and wellbeing. The review further illustrated the power that the animal agricultural industry has politically and how it routinely squashes voices of opposition. By using EBSCO’s range of databases, we were able to synthesize a bigger picture understanding of how the animal agricultural industry is creating and maintaining health and wellbeing risks that disproportionately harm marginalized communities in North Carolina. It is our hope that awareness of factory farming’s bigger picture impact will empower people to take action through use of their own unique strengths, capabilities and resources to address this environmental injustice.