Wildfire Smoke Exposure and Health Impacts for Outdoor Building Construction Workers in California

9 pages•Published: December 11, 2023

Abstract

Exposure to wildfire-related smoke has serious implications for the health outcomes of outdoor occupational workers. As wildfire season is becoming more prolonged in California, outdoor building construction workers are at great risk of exposure to particulate matter (PM2.5) pollution caused by wildfire smoke. Wildfire smoke PM2.5 exposure has been shown to result in short-term health impairments, missed workdays, and long-term disease progression. Studies highlighting the exposure of outdoor building construction workers to wildfire-related PM2.5 is limited in the existing literature. Using historical wildfires data, employment data of outdoor building construction workers, and air quality data for PM2.5 pollution from 2010-2020, this paper investigates the potential exposure of outdoor building construction workers to wildfire smoke PM2.5 in California. Counties which experienced wildfire events were identified by intersecting wildfire perimeters with county boundaries using the geospatial analysis software ArcGIS. Monthly employment during wildfire months and the number of days when the PM2.5 air quality reached unhealthy levels during those months were evaluated to find the worker smoke exposure days of each county. Results show that outdoor building construction workers in California are vulnerable to wildfire PM2.5 exposure and associated health risks, as the typical wildfire season aligns with peak seasonal construction work.

Keyphrases: building construction, california, outdoor worker health, wildfire

In: Tom Leathem, Wes Collins and Anthony Perrenoud (editors). Proceedings of 59th Annual Associated Schools of Construction International Conference, vol 4, pages 532-540.

Links:	https://easychair.org/publications/paper/qLQw
	https://doi.org/10.29007/zcxq

BibTeX entry

@inproceedings{ASC2023:Wildfire_Smoke_Exposure_Health,
  author    = {Srijesh Pradhan and Erin Arneson},
  title     = {Wildfire Smoke Exposure and Health Impacts for Outdoor Building Construction Workers in California},
  booktitle = {Proceedings of 59th Annual Associated Schools of Construction International Conference},
  editor    = {Tom Leathem and Wes Collins and Anthony Perrenoud},
  series    = {EPiC Series in Built Environment},
  volume    = {4},
  publisher = {EasyChair},
  bibsource = {EasyChair, https://easychair.org},
  issn      = {2632-881X},
  url       = {/publications/paper/qLQw},
  doi       = {10.29007/zcxq},
  pages     = {532-540},
  year      = {2023}}

Download PDF Open PDF in browser