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The smoke and smog from those engines and appliances directly kill nine million people a year

I’ll address the “nine million people a year” estimate. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 7 million people a year “die prematurely” from air pollution. They break this down into household pollution, which according to their estimates causes 3.8 million premature deaths, and ambient (outdoor) air pollution, which causes 4.2 million premature deaths.^* You can find detailed explanations of the nature of these sources of pollution and references to further resources on the above-linked web pages.

^{* Since 3.8+4.2=8 and yet the WHO cites 7 million as the estimate for the total air pollution deaths, presumably that means that 1 million of the premature deaths are classified as being brought about by both indoor and outdoor air pollution.}

Now, 7 million is not that far from 9 million, so in that sense McKibben’s estimate appears plausible. However, I see a couple of issues with his way of presenting things:

• “directly kills” seems stronger than “causes premature deaths”, which is a vague and not precisely quantified statement. (E.g., if someone died six months sooner than they would have otherwise because pollution exacerbated some medical condition they had, it’s probably misleading to say they were “directly killed”, but “died prematurely” sounds more correct.)

• McKibben’s article focuses on humanity’s need to stop burning fossil fuels (e.g., the article’s subheadline reads “The truth is new and counterintuitive: we have the technology necessary to rapidly ditch fossil fuels”). However, the 3.8 million premature deaths from household pollution are, according to WHO’s explanation, “attributable to inefficient cooking practices using polluting stoves paired with solid fuels and kerosene.” The WHO also writes: “Around 2.6 billion people cook using polluting open fires or simple stoves fuelled by kerosene, biomass (wood, animal dung and crop waste) and coal.”

  Now, biomass is not a fossil fuel, so if you’re only interested in deaths related to fossil fuels, the 3.8 million figure is surely an overcount. But McKibben’s writing conveniently conflates multiple sources of pollution in a single paragraph by talking less precisely about “fires”, (and its synonyms “combustion” and “blazes” — well, this is a New Yorker article after all…), while making the overall target of the article appear to be fossil fuels specifically.

  In any case, from the WHO’s explanation it’s clear that these household pollution premature deaths are caused largely due to the terrible methods of burning fuel (whether fossil-based or not), which result in huge amounts of harmful particulate matter being released, rather than to the mere fact of the burning itself. So if you count these deaths in the seven million statistic, the marshaling of these deaths in support of McKibben’s “stop burning things” argument seems a bit dishonest to me. And if you don’t count them, then we are down to only 4.2 million deaths from outdoor pollution, which is quite far from McKibben’s 9 million.

Summary: the WHO is not necessarily the only or most authoritative source of data on this topic, so McKibben might be relying on another source that’s equally credible. However, at least when cross checking his claims against the WHO’s data, they seem a tad hyperbolic to me.

The smoke and smog from those engines and appliances directly kill nine million people a year

I’ll address the “nine million people a year” estimate. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 7 million people a year “die prematurely” from air pollution. They break this down into household pollution, which according to their estimates causes 3.8 million premature deaths, and ambient (outdoor) air pollution, which causes 4.2 million premature deaths.^* You can find detailed explanations of the nature of these sources of pollution and references to further resources on the above-linked web pages.

^{* Since 3.8+4.2=8 and yet the WHO cites 7 million as the estimate for the total air pollution deaths, presumably that means that 1 million of the premature deaths are classified as being brought about by both indoor and outdoor air pollution.}

Now, 7 million is not that far from 9 million, so in that sense McKibben’s estimate appears plausible. However, I see a couple of issues with his way of presenting things:

• “directly kills” seems stronger than “causes premature deaths”, which is a vague and not precisely quantified statement. (E.g., if someone died six months sooner than they would have otherwise because pollution exacerbated some medical condition they had, it’s probably misleading to say they were “directly killed”, but “died prematurely” sounds more correct.)

• McKibben’s article focuses on humanity’s need to stop burning fossil fuels (e.g., the article’s subheadline reads “The truth is new and counterintuitive: we have the technology necessary to rapidly ditch fossil fuels”). However, the 3.8 million premature deaths from household pollution are, according to WHO’s explanation, “attributable to inefficient cooking practices using polluting stoves paired with solid fuels and kerosene.” The WHO also writes: “Around 2.6 billion people cook using polluting open fires or simple stoves fuelled by kerosene, biomass (wood, animal dung and crop waste) and coal.”

  Now, biomass is not a fossil fuel, so if you’re only interested in deaths related to fossil fuels, the 3.8 million figure is surely an overcount. But McKibben’s writing seems to conflate multiple sources of pollution in a single paragraph by talking less precisely about “fires”, (and its synonyms “combustion” and “blazes” — well, this is a New Yorker article after all…), while making the overall target of the article appear to be fossil fuels specifically.

  In any case, from the WHO’s explanation it’s clear that these household pollution premature deaths are caused largely due to the terrible methods of burning fuel (whether fossil-based or not), which result in huge amounts of harmful particulate matter being released, rather than to the mere fact of the burning itself. So if you count these deaths in the seven million statistic, the marshaling of these deaths in support of McKibben’s “stop burning things” argument seems a bit dishonest to me. And if you don’t count them, then we are down to only 4.2 million deaths from outdoor pollution, which is quite far from McKibben’s 9 million.

Summary: the WHO is not necessarily the only or most authoritative source of data on this topic, so McKibben might be relying on another source that’s equally credible. However, at least when cross checking his claims against the WHO’s data, they seem a tad hyperbolic to me.

The smoke and smog from those engines and appliances directly kill nine million people a year

I’ll address the “nine million people a year” estimate. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 8 million people a year “die prematurely” from air pollution. They break this down into household pollution, which according to their estimates causes 3.8 million premature deaths, and ambient (outdoor) air pollution, which causes 4.2 million premature deaths. You can find detailed explanations of the nature of these sources of pollution and references to further resources on the above-linked web pages.

Now, 8 million is fairly close to 9 million, so in that sense McKibben’s estimate appears plausible. However, I see a couple of issues with his way of presenting things:

• “directly kills” seems stronger than “causes premature deaths”, which is a vague and not precisely quantified statement. (E.g., if someone died six months sooner than they would have otherwise because pollution exacerbated some medical condition they had, it’s probably misleading to say they were “directly killed”, but “died prematurely” sounds more correct.)

• McKibben’s article focuses on humanity’s need to stop burning fossil fuels (e.g., the article’s subheadline reads “The truth is new and counterintuitive: we have the technology necessary to rapidly ditch fossil fuels”). However, the 3.8 million premature deaths from household pollution are, according to WHO’s explanation, “attributable to inefficient cooking practices using polluting stoves paired with solid fuels and kerosene.” The WHO also writes: “Around 2.6 billion people cook using polluting open fires or simple stoves fuelled by kerosene, biomass (wood, animal dung and crop waste) and coal.”

  Now, biomass is not a fossil fuel, so if you’re only interested in deaths related to fossil fuels, the 3.8 million figure is surely an overcount. But McKibben’s writing conveniently conflates multiple sources of pollution in a single paragraph by talking less precisely about “fires”, (and its synonyms “combustion” and “blazes” — well, this is a New Yorker article after all…), while making the overall target of the article appear to be fossil fuels specifically.

  In any case, from the WHO’s explanation it’s clear that these household pollution premature deaths are caused largely due to the terrible methods of burning fuel (whether fossil-based or not), which result in huge amounts of harmful particulate matter being released, rather than to the mere fact of the burning itself. So if you count these deaths in the eight million statistic, the marshaling of these deaths in support of McKibben’s “stop burning things” argument seems a bit dishonest to me. And if you don’t count them, then we are down to only 4.2 million deaths from outdoor pollution, which is quite far from McKibben’s 9 million.

Summary: the WHO is not necessarily the only or most authoritative source of data on this topic, so McKibben might be relying on another source that’s equally credible. However, at least when cross checking his claims against the WHO’s data, they seem a tad hyperbolic to me.

The smoke and smog from those engines and appliances directly kill nine million people a year

I’ll address the “nine million people a year” estimate. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 7 million people a year “die prematurely” from air pollution. They break this down into household pollution, which according to their estimates causes 3.8 million premature deaths, and ambient (outdoor) air pollution, which causes 4.2 million premature deaths.^* You can find detailed explanations of the nature of these sources of pollution and references to further resources on the above-linked web pages.

^{* Since 3.8+4.2=8 and yet the WHO cites 7 million as the estimate for the total air pollution deaths, presumably that means that 1 million of the premature deaths are classified as being brought about by both indoor and outdoor air pollution.}

Now, 7 million is not that far from 9 million, so in that sense McKibben’s estimate appears plausible. However, I see a couple of issues with his way of presenting things:

• “directly kills” seems stronger than “causes premature deaths”, which is a vague and not precisely quantified statement. (E.g., if someone died six months sooner than they would have otherwise because pollution exacerbated some medical condition they had, it’s probably misleading to say they were “directly killed”, but “died prematurely” sounds more correct.)

• McKibben’s article focuses on humanity’s need to stop burning fossil fuels (e.g., the article’s subheadline reads “The truth is new and counterintuitive: we have the technology necessary to rapidly ditch fossil fuels”). However, the 3.8 million premature deaths from household pollution are, according to WHO’s explanation, “attributable to inefficient cooking practices using polluting stoves paired with solid fuels and kerosene.” The WHO also writes: “Around 2.6 billion people cook using polluting open fires or simple stoves fuelled by kerosene, biomass (wood, animal dung and crop waste) and coal.”

  Now, biomass is not a fossil fuel, so if you’re only interested in deaths related to fossil fuels, the 3.8 million figure is surely an overcount. But McKibben’s writing conveniently conflates multiple sources of pollution in a single paragraph by talking less precisely about “fires”, (and its synonyms “combustion” and “blazes” — well, this is a New Yorker article after all…), while making the overall target of the article appear to be fossil fuels specifically.

  In any case, from the WHO’s explanation it’s clear that these household pollution premature deaths are caused largely due to the terrible methods of burning fuel (whether fossil-based or not), which result in huge amounts of harmful particulate matter being released, rather than to the mere fact of the burning itself. So if you count these deaths in the seven million statistic, the marshaling of these deaths in support of McKibben’s “stop burning things” argument seems a bit dishonest to me. And if you don’t count them, then we are down to only 4.2 million deaths from outdoor pollution, which is quite far from McKibben’s 9 million.

Summary: the WHO is not necessarily the only or most authoritative source of data on this topic, so McKibben might be relying on another source that’s equally credible. However, at least when cross checking his claims against the WHO’s data, they seem a tad hyperbolic to me.

The smoke and smog from those engines and appliances directly kill nine million people a year

I’ll address the “nine million people a year” estimate. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 8 million people a year “die prematurely” from air pollution. They break this down into household pollution, which according to their estimates causes 3.8 million premature deaths, and ambient (outdoor) air pollution, which causes 4.2 million premature deaths. You can find detailed explanations of the nature of these sources of pollution and references to further resources on the above-linked web pages.

Now, 8 million is fairly close to 9 million, so in that sense McKibben’s estimate appears plausible. However, I see a couple of issues with his way of presenting things:

• “directly kills” seems stronger than “causes premature deaths”, which is a vague and not precisely quantified statement. (E.g., if someone died six months sooner than they would have otherwise because pollution exacerbated some medical condition they had, it’s probably misleading to say they were “directly killed”, but “died prematurely” sounds more correct.)

• McKibben’s article focuses on humanity’s need to stop burning fossil fuels (e.g., the article’s subheadline reads “The truth is new and counterintuitive: we have the technology necessary to rapidly ditch fossil fuels”). However, the 3.8 million premature deaths from household pollution are, according to WHO’s explanation, “attributable to inefficient cooking practices using polluting stoves paired with solid fuels and kerosene.” The WHO also writes: “Around 2.6 billion people cook using polluting open fires or simple stoves fuelled by kerosene, biomass (wood, animal dung and crop waste) and coal.”

  Now, biomass is not a fossil fuel, so if you’re only interested in deaths related to fossil fuels, the 3.8 million figure is surely an overcount. But McKibben’s writing conveniently conflates multiple sources of pollution in a single paragraph by talking less precisely about “fires”, (and its synonyms “combustion” and “blazes” — well, this is a New Yorker article after all…), while making the overall target of the article appear to be fossil fuels specifically.

  In any case, from the WHO’s explanation it’s clear that these household pollution premature deaths are caused largely due to the terrible methods of burning fuel (whether fossil-based or not), which result in huge amounts of harmful particulate matter being released, rather than to the mere fact of the burning itself. So if you count these deaths in the eight million statistic, the marshaling of these deaths in support of McKibben’s “stop burning things” argument seems a bit dishonest to me. And if you don’t count them, then we are down to only 4.2 million deaths from outdoor pollution, which is quite far from McKibben’s 9 million.

Summary: the WHO is not necessarily the only or most authoritative source of data on this topic, so McKibben might be relying on another source that’s equally credible. However, at least when cross checking his claims against the WHO’s data, they seem a tad hyperbolic to me.

The smoke and smog from those engines and appliances directly kill nine million people a year

I’ll address the “nine million people a year” estimate. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 8 million people a year “die prematurely” from air pollution. They break this down into household pollution, which according to their estimates causes 3.8 million premature deaths, and ambient (outdoor) air pollution, which causes 4.2 million premature deaths. You can find detailed explanations of the nature of these sources of pollution and references to further resources on the above-linked web pages.

Now, 8 million is fairly close to 9 million, so in that sense McKibben’s estimate appears plausible. However, I see a couple of issues with his way of presenting things:

• “directly kills” seems stronger than “causes premature deaths”, which is a vague and not precisely quantified statement. (E.g., if someone died six months sooner than they would have otherwise because pollution exacerbated some medical condition they had, it’s probably misleading to say they were “directly killed”, but “died prematurely” sounds more correct.)

• McKibben’s article focuses on humanity’s need to stop burning fossil fuels (e.g., the article’s subheadline reads “The truth is new and counterintuitive: we have the technology necessary to rapidly ditch fossil fuels”). However, the 3.8 million premature deaths from household pollution are, according to WHO’s explanation, “attributable to inefficient cooking practices using polluting stoves paired with solid fuels and kerosene.” The WHO also writes: “Around 2.6 billion people cook using polluting open fires or simple stoves fuelled by kerosene, biomass (wood, animal dung and crop waste) and coal.”

  Now, biomass is not a fossil fuel, so if you’re only interested in deaths related to fossil fuels, the 3.8 million figure is surely an overcount. But McKibben’s writing conveniently conflates multiple sources of pollution in a single paragraph by talking less precisely about “fires”, (and its synonyms “combustion” and “blazes” — well, this is a New Yorker article after all…), while making the overall target of the article appear to be fossil fuels specifically.

  In any case, from the WHO’s explanation it’s clear that these household pollution premature deaths are caused largely due to the terrible methods of burning fuel (whether fossil-based or not), which result in huge amounts of harmful particulate matter being released, rather than to the mere fact of the burning itself. So if you count these deaths in the eight million statistic, the marshaling of these deaths in support of McKibben’s “stop burning things” argument seems a bit dishonest to me. And if you don’t count them, then we are down to only 4.2 million deaths from outdoor pollution, which is quite far from McKibben’s 9 million.

Summary: the WHO is not necessarily the only or most authoritative source of data on this topic, so McKibben might be relying on another source that’s equally credible. However, at least when cross checking his claims against the WHO’s data, they seem a tad hyperbolic to me.