Biomass energy plants: see themselves as a cost-effective solution for farmers who need to get rid of dead trees and other woody waste that pose wildfire risks without openly burning them; they also produce energy
Utilities companies: looking for the "least-cost, best-fit" source of energy, don't care where it comes from just that it's reasonably priced
Farmers: need cheap ways to dispose of waste
Technology to dispose of woody waste from almond trees in ways other than open burning or biomass facilities doesn't exist yet, at least at the scale needed for massive almond orchards
Closures of biomass energy plants have forced SJVAPCD to allow more open burning of agricultural waste, which produces particulate matter and contributes to already severe air quality in the Central Valley
Google Scholar search for “Louisiana Tumor Registry”
“Air pollution is linked to higher cancer rates among black or impoverished communities in Louisiana”, Kimberly A Terrell and Gianna St Julien 2022 Environ. Res. Lett. 17 014033 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ac4360#artAbst
Lawsuit led by River Region Crime Commission (RRCC) to retrieve LTR information
http://www.la-fcca.org/Opinions/PUB2004/2004-04/2003CA0079.Apr2004.Pub.12.pdf
Article by Barbara Allen (2005). The problem with epidemiology data in assessing environmental health impacts of toxic sites
https://www.witpress.com/Secure/elibrary/papers/EEH05/EEH05048FU.pdf
“The registry focuses on cancer incidence, which can be caused by a number of factors, instead of the risk faced by people exposed to emissions from industrial operations. In Terrell's view, that has allowed companies and by the state Department of Environmental Quality to misconstrue its significance.” (Mitchell 2021)
“While scientists will argue that the one-year reporting standard, as set by the state statute, is arbitrary, a five-year reporting timetable is equally arbitrary and less sensitive to changing health patterns. More problematic, however, were the eight large geographic regions. Each region consisted of as many as twelve parishes (a parish is a county in Louisiana) and in the case of the regions that include the parishes of the chemical corridor, industrial parishes are “diluted” by non-industrial parishes, making the determination of elevated cancer rates near chemical plants impossible to decide. The LTR also tends to downplay the rarer cancers, both adult and pediatric, saying the “rates tend to fluctuate because of small numbers...[and] are less reliable and should be cautiously interpreted” [4]. This infuriates the residents and researchers as these rare cancers are of major concern as they may be linked to chemical exposure.”
Response to new health study (March 2021)
Incidence, mortality, cancer stage, pediatric, cancer survivors
State, parish, and regional data (and soon census tract data in the LDH Dashboard)