“The Road to Clean Air” is a national report by the American Lung Association highlighting the potential for major public health benefits of widespread electrification of the transportation sector. Across the United States, the transportation sector is a leading source of harmful air pollution threatening the health of the public. Transportation pollution and poor air quality are associated with an increased risk of a wide range of negative health outcomes including asthma attacks, lost work days and premature deaths. People who live near major roadways, lower-income communities and communities of color often face disproportionate exposures to harmful pollution, along with poor health outcomes, making health and climate equity key to the electric vehicle discussion. Children, seniors and those living with respiratory, cardiovascular and other chronic health conditions are also more vulnerable to poor air quality. The transportation sector is also the leading contributor to climate change, which harms health in a number of ways, including by degrading air quality.
Our air quality and climate crises demand steady, consistent progress toward moving our passenger vehicles, transit and school buses, delivery vans and the broad trucking sector away from combustion and toward non-polluting vehicles powered by more non-combustion renewable energy. The analysis illustrates that transitioning to zero-emission transportation solutions along with increasing levels of renewable energy by mid-century will save thousands of lives, avoid tens of thousands of asthma attacks, hundreds of thousands of other health impacts, and avoid tens of billions of dollars in health costs as a result of significant pollution reductions. In addition, moving to eliminate combustion from the transportation sector will yield significant reductions in greenhouse gases that drive wide-ranging climate change impacts on air quality and public health. The dual air pollution and climate change health crises facing America today must be addressed immediately, with electric vehicles and clean energy playing a leading role in the solution.
