@article{27499084d0024ce993597479accc0703,
title = "Retirements of coal and oil power plants in California: Association with reduced preterm birth among populations nearby",
abstract = "Coal and oil power plant retirements reduce air pollution nearby, but few studies have leveraged these natural experiments for public health research. We used California Department of Public Health birth records and US Energy Information Administration data from 2001-2011 to evaluate the relationship between the retirements of 8 coal and oil power plants and nearby preterm (gestational age of <37 weeks) birth. We conducted a difference-in-differences analysis using adjusted linear mixed models that included 57,005 births-6.3% of which were preterm-to compare the probability of preterm birth before and after power plant retirement among mothers residing within 0-5 km and 5-10 km of the 8 power plants.We found that power plant retirements were associated with a decrease in the proportion of preterm birth within 5 km (-0.019, 95% CI: -0.031, -0.008) and 5-10 km (-0.015, 95% CI: -0.024, -0.007), controlling for secular trends with mothers living 10-20 km away. For the 0-5-km area, this corresponds to a reduction in preterm birth from 7.0% to 5.1%. Subgroup analyses indicated a potentially larger association among non- Hispanic black and Asian mothers than among non-Hispanic white and Hispanic mothers and no differences in educational attainment. Future coal and oil power plant retirements may reduce pretermbirth among nearby populations.",
keywords = "Birth certificates, Birth outcomes, California, Coal, Environmental epidemiology, Natural experiment, Power plants, Premature birth",
author = "Casey, {Joan A.} and Deborah Karasek and Ogburn, {Elizabeth L.} and Goin, {Dana E.} and Kristina Dang and Braveman, {Paula A.} and Rachel Morello-Frosch",
note = "Funding Information: Author affiliations: Division of Environmental Health Sciences, School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, California (Joan A. Casey, Rachel Morello-Frosch); Preterm Birth Initiative, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, California (Deborah Karasek); Department of Biostatistics, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland (Elizabeth L. Ogburn); Division of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, California (Dana E. Goin); Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, California (Kristina Dang); Center on Social Disparities in Health, Department of Family and Community Medicine, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, California (Paula A. Braveman); and Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, California (Rachel Morello-Frosch). This work was supported in part by the University of California, San Francisco, Preterm Birth Initiative. Additional support was provided by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (grant K99ES027023 to J.A. C. and grants P01ES022841 and R01ES027051) and the US Environmental Protection Agency (grant RD-83543301 to R.M.-F.). We thank Dr. Elena Krieger for her assistance in assembling the power plant data, and Dr. Janelle Downing and the University of California at Berkeley D-Lab for assistance in accessing the foreclosure data. Conflict of interest: none declared. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2018 Oxford University Press. All Rights Reserved.",
year = "2018",
month = aug,
day = "1",
doi = "10.1093/aje/kwy110",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "187",
pages = "1586--1594",
journal = "American Journal of Epidemiology",
issn = "0002-9262",
publisher = "Oxford University Press",
number = "8",
}