The Inflation Reduction Act signed into law Tuesday includes more than $360 billion to address climate change. But some people living in neighborhoods that are already dealing with a lot of pollution fear they'll face more harm and climate risk, not less.
A line of petrochemical facilities in St. Charles Parish, La., in 2018. Many people who live near industrial sites, and who are exposed to dangerous pollution, fear that the Inflation Reduction Act will deepen existing environmental inequalities.
“There are some parts [of the law] that are good, and there are some parts that are really bad,” says Mijin Cha, a professor at Occidental University who studies how to make the transition to a low-carbon economy fairer for workers and communities. “And the parts [of the law] that are really bad are pretty significant.”
For example, Jhong-Chung says the new law could pay for air monitoring in Southwest Detroit, where he lives and where industrial air pollution makes people sick. But at the same time, the law invests in the fossil fuel industry, which could help those industrial facilities operate for decades to come.
The White House estimates that the law includes over $60 billion in spending on so-called environmental justice. That includes money to reduce emissions around U.S. ports, plant trees in city neighborhoods that are “This bill is the product of compromise,” he says, referring to the drawn-out Congressional negotiations that finally led to the bill’s passage. “Without compromise there would be no bill.”
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