Although electric vehicle ownership is higher in wealthier neighborhoods than in disadvantaged ones, EVs improve air quality in all communities, a UCLA study found.
The study determined that widespread EV travel meant disadvantaged communities experienced 40% more pollution-reduction than other areas, but that was a large percentage of a small number. Meanwhile, low-income neighborhoods still faced significantly higher pollution levels than other communities, because of the higher volume of all vehicle trips in their vicinity. The paper published Dec. 12 in the journal Nature Communications.
“Because EVs travel all over, the benefits from reduced tailpipe emissions get shared across communities,” said senior author of the study and air quality researcher Yifang Zhu, a professor in the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health and the UCLA Institute of the Environment and Sustainability. ”That’s encouraging, but there’s still a gap in who gets clean air, and it’s a big gap.”
The study, which also included authors from the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering, recommended policies offering more financial incentives for lower-income households to purchase zero-emission and electric vehicles, such as battery-electric, plug-in hybrid, and hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles. The researchers also strongly recommended that the state require medium- and heavy-duty vehicles—such as shipping and delivery trucks—to transition to zero-emission, since larger vehicles emit more pollution than smaller ones.
“Drivers in disadvantaged communities and lower-income communities don’t own as many zero-emission vehicles as those in more affluent areas, and they live near transit arteries full of vehicles that still produce massive amounts of pollution,” Zhu said. “To make a transition equitable and healthy, we need to encourage EV adoption across the board, we need to clean up the heavy fleet, we need to address brake and tire wear particles, and we need to include disadvantaged communities in discussions about the transition.”
2023-12-14 01:00:04
Original from phys.org rnrn