Social Inequalities Related to Hazardous Incinerator Emissions: An Additional Level of Environmental Injustice

Environmental justice (EJ) research focuses on disproportionate population exposures to multiple point and non-point pollution sources. The hazardous pollutants released by waste incinerators can contribute to uneven (or unjust) spatial and social distributions of environmental risks. The EJ literature has already revealed that the geographical distribution of incinerators generates distinct social inequalities. In the French context, these inequalities are evident when considering the proportion of unemployed people, the proportion of recent immigrants and the proportion of persons born abroad (each increases the likelihood that a town hosts an incinerator). In this article, we seek to determine whether additional social injustices occur due to disproportionate quantities of incinerator emissions.

 We collected annual nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions from all incinerators in France for 2009–2010. We found that incinerators in French municipalities with higher unemployment and higher proportions of immigrants and persons born abroad have higher NOx emission levels, even when controlling for population size and broader regional social and environmental deprivation indices. This indicates that incinerators in France generate higher social inequalities than initially thought, both due to their spatial distribution and to the amount of emissions they release. We recommend that unequal social impacts should be considered in waste management planning, facility siting decisions, and decisions affecting emission controls for existing and possible future incinerators in France.