A new tool that pairs satellite imagery with AI has uncovered some of the strongest evidence yet of the extent to which electrification fuels economic growth. (Source: Stanford News)

Pollution from wildfires is linked to lower test scores and possibly lower future earnings for kids growing up with more smoke days at school, a new study finds. Impacts of smoke exposure on earnings are disproportionately borne by economically disadvantaged communities of color.

Stanford researchers have developed an AI model for predicting dangerous particle pollution to help track the American West’s rapidly worsening wildfire smoke. The detailed results show millions of Americans are routinely exposed to pollution at levels rarely seen just a decade ago.

Unlike flooding or drought or heat, the menace of smoke in the American West is not compartmentalized along class lines; in fact, as Stanford’s Marshall Burke and his research partners have documented, U.S. smoke exposure is largely uncorrelated with income.

In a Stanford study of hospitalizations near the 2018 Camp Fire, a week of heavy smoke exposure was linked to a five percent increased risk of preterm births.

When wildfire smoke descends, Californians are told to close windows and run air purifiers. But this advice may not be widely followed, according to a study led by Marshall Burke. And the disparity between wealthy and low-income neighborhoods is significant.

Most government policies for mitigating public health risks from wildfire smoke aim to educate citizens to protect themselves by staying indoors, closing windows, and using air filters. Stanford research shows why that approach fails for Americans across all income groups and points to solutions.

Associate professor of Earth system science Marshall Burke comments on the climate impacts of having children, stating that more people doesn’t necessarily mean a warmer Earth.

Much of the debate around climate change and climate policy centers on the price tag of doing something. But the costs of inaction, in terms of overall livelihoods and economic well being, are far greater, explains Stanford environmental economist Marshall Burke. (Source: Stanford Center for Innovation in Global Health)

Marshall Burke, Noah Diffenbaugh and Gabrielle Wong-Parodi are interviewed in a segment about a unique partnership in California that uses behavioral science and cultural awareness in climate studies to help communities cope with extreme weather.

“The rate of change has been so dramatic. If I was the California tourism industry, I’d be really worried," said Stanford environmental economist Marshall Burke. What’s even more disruptive than fire, he said, is its erratic sidekick: smoke.

A 14-year analysis of air quality data across California led by Stanford Earth's David Gonzalez and Marshall Burke revealed residents who live within 2.5 miles of oil and gas wells are exposed to elevated levels of toxic gases.

Researchers found increased concentrations of air pollutants downwind from oil and gas wells in California, likely affecting millions of Californians who live near them.

An analysis of federal satellite imagery by NPR’s California Newsroom and associate professor Marshall Burke's lab at Stanford shows smoke from Western wildfires is is choking vast swaths of the country.

New Stanford research highlights the importance of pollutants associated with wildfire smoke, which might be different from other sources of air pollution, and are becoming more of an issue with climate change. 

A study from Stanford University estimates that the effects of wildfire smoke may have resulted in as many as 7,000 extra preterm births in California between 2007 and 2012.

Exposure to wildfire smoke during pregnancy increases the risk of preterm birth – a risk that is only getting worse, a new study from Stanford University has found.

Smoke from wildfires may have contributed to thousands of additional premature births in California between 2007 and 2012. The findings underscore the value of reducing the risk of big, extreme wildfires and suggest pregnant people should avoid very smoky air.

Higher temperatures attributed to climate change caused payouts from the nation’s biggest farm support program to increase by $27 billion between 1991 and 2017, according to new estimates from Stanford researchers. Costs are likely to rise even further with the growing intensity and frequency of heat waves and other severe weather events.

Warnings of another severe wildfire season abound, as do efforts to reduce the risk of ignition. Yet few are taking precautions against the smoke. Stanford experts advise on contending with hazardous air quality.

In a Q&A, Stanford economists describe what the social cost of carbon is, how it is calculated and used in policymaking, and how it relates to environmental justice. (Source: Stanford News)

“Our research suggests that many more people likely perish from smoke exposure during large fire events than perish directly in the fire, and many more people are made sick,” said Stanford environmental economist Marshall Burke. 

Analysis of sales data and flood risk data over two decades indicates that housing markets fail to fully account for information about flood risk. The findings suggest that policies to improve risk communication could influence market outcomes.

Monitoring environmental compliance is a particular challenge for governments in poor countries. A new machine learning approach that uses satellite imagery to pinpoint highly polluting brick kilns in Bangladesh could provide a low-cost solution.

A collection of research and insights from Stanford experts who are revealing the stakes of emission cuts, enabling better carbon accounting, predicting the consequences of future emission pathways and mapping out viable solutions.

Satellite imagery shows air pollution levels bounced back to pre-pandemic numbers after a decline due to COVID-19 lockdowns. Environmental economist Marshall Burke said, "the better air quality could have saved between 50,000 and 75,000 people from dying prematurely."

Using government satellite images instead of air quality data, Marshall Burke projected an increase in smoky days in coming years. “In the future, it’s going to get worse than 2020,” he says. “We should expect that.”

“In 2020, we saw roughly 60 days with wildfire smoke that was in the air that we breathed, up from 10 to 15 days just a decade ago,” said Stanford environmental economist Marshall Burke. 

"Most people do not see sea-level rise. Most people do not ever see hurricanes. Many, many people will see wildfire smoke from climate change," said Stanford environmental economist Marshall Burke. 

“We know smoke is bad for health. But we really didn’t have a comprehensive national picture for how much wildfires are contributing to poor air quality,” said Marshall Burke.

Wildfire smoke has resulted in as much as half of the soot pollution in parts of the western U.S., according to a study led by Stanford environmental economist Marshall Burke.

Research by Frances Davenport, Noah Diffenbaugh  and Marshall Burke shows that over the past three decades, the U.S. has had nearly $75 billion in damage from floods fueled by the climate crisis. 

Wildfire smoke will be one of the most widely felt health impacts of climate change throughout the country, but U.S. clean air regulations are not equipped to deal with it. Stanford experts discuss the causes and impacts of wildfire activity and its rapid acceleration in the American west.

Flooding has caused hundreds of billions of dollars in damage in the U.S. over the past three decades. Researchers found that 36 percent of the costs of flooding in the U.S. from 1988 to 2017 were a result of intensifying precipitation, consistent with predictions of global warming.

“Most people do not see sea-level rise. Most people do not ever see hurricanes. Many, many people will see wildfire smoke from climate change,” said Marshall Burke. 

In an analysis published in March, Marshall Burke found that a coronavirus lockdown in China probably saved more lives from a reduction in air pollution – which is linked to climate change – than it lost to Covid-19. 

“A lot of the news coverage focuses on immediate danger: people with homes in harm’s way,” said Marshall Burke. “The impacts are much, much larger than that … they extend all over the place to people hundreds of miles away from wildfire.”

Marshall Burke projects that over the next 80 years, per capita G.D.P. in the United States will drop by 36 percent compared to what it would be in a nonwarming world, even as per capita G.D.P. in Russia will quadruple.

Smoke pollution is beginning to reverse California's recent air quality gains, Stanford's Marshall Burke explains. His own personal experience shows how inequitable the impact of wildfire smoke pollution can be.

Stanford environmental economist Marshall Burke discusses the cost of ignoring climate change with "The Daily Show" correspondent Dulcé Sloan.

Marshall Burke has found that, across California, as the number of smoke days has risen, it has begun to reverse gains the state had made in cleaning up its air from conventional sources of pollution. 

Catastrophic blazes this year present an unprecedented threat to health and property. Stanford's Marshall Burke, Sam Heft-Neal and Michael Wara estimate that poor air quality from this year’s wildfires will kill thousands of people in California alone.

Research led by Marshall Burke of Stanford Earth found a link between hotter than average temperatures and increased suicide rates.

A study by Noah Diffenbaugh and Marshall Burke found that in the past 50 years warming had slowed economic growth in those parts of the world which have emitted the least carbon, perhaps by as much as 25 percent.

In a Sept. 18 webinar, Chris Field and Marshall Burke were among four Stanford panelists who discussed new evidence on the health impacts of exposure to wildfire and wildfire smoke, and implications for what individuals and policymakers can do to reduce impacts.

Recent wildfires on the West Coast have exposed numerous people to polluted air that has led to health problems and death. To minimize the risk of wildfires and air pollution, Marshall Burke is finding ways to understand what role climate change plays in the probability of wildfires.  

On Sept. 22, Marshall Burke explored how COVID-19 has impacted air quality and identified unintended benefits for the Democracy Matters webinar series.

Researchers hypothesize outcomes of the pandemic’s unprecedented socioeconomic disruption, and outline research priorities for advancing our understanding of humans’ impact on the environment.

New research shows living near oil and gas development in California is a risk factor for preterm birth, the leading cause of infant death in the United States. About 2.1 million Californians live within one mile of an active oil or gas well.

A new tool combines publicly accessible satellite imagery with AI to track poverty across African villages over time.

Earth system scientist Marshall Burke calculated that tens of thousands of lives were saved in China due to cleaner air.

Marshall Burke discusses how the current situation gives insight into the costs of polluting economies and how they might be changed to improve health outcomes.

Marshall Burke discusses the environmental impact of billions staying at home worldwide.

"I hope the things we have been forced to experiment with here will lead to changes in our own personal behavior," Marshall Burke comments in a roundup of Stanford research projects about COVID-19.

The coronavirus isn't just a public-health crisis. It's an ecological one. The article cites Stanford professor Marshall Burke's estimates of lives saved by the reduction in pollution from the shutdown of factories in Wuhan, China.

“Lives we lose absent a pandemic are also really important, and are lives we shouldn’t lose,” says Stanford Earth's Marshall Burke.

Stanford Earth's Marshall Burke estimates that the reduction in PM2.5 pollution from the coronavirus lockdown in China has saved tens of thousands of lives. How long will these reductions last?   

The coronavirus pandemic has not only quickly changed the livelihoods of millions of people around the globe, but also the environment. The reduction in emissions from COVID-19 countermeasures has saved tens of thousands of lives in China alone, according to Marshall Burke. 

Stanford Earth professor Marshall Burke explains what we can learn from the pollution drop during China's COVID-19 lockdown. 

China's COVID-19 countermeasures have slashed toxic air pollution. Between 50,000 and 75,000 lives have been saved due to the decreasing air pollution in China, according to Marshall Burke.

"The reductions in air pollution in China caused by this economic disruption likely saved 20 times more lives in China than have currently been lost due to infection with the virus in that country," Marshall Burke said. 

Stanford Earth's Marshall Burke says a preliminary estimate of premature deaths avoided due to cleaner air in China offers "a useful reminder of the often-hidden health consequences of the status quo.”

 “The lives saved due to the pollution reductions are roughly 20x the number of lives that have been directly lost to the virus," says Stanford Earth professor Marshall Burke.

Stanford Earth professor Marshall Burke's calculation of how the coronavirus affects air quality is cited in the context of a discussion of the "political, financial and economic storm" facing climate change advocates.

Rockefeller Foundation president Rajiv Shah discusses Atlas AI, a company focused on social impact that was co-founded by Stanford's David Lobell, Marshall Burke and Stefano Ermon.

By analyzing more than two decades of data in the western U.S., scientists have shown that flood sizes increase exponentially as a higher fraction of precipitation falls as rain, offering insight into how flood risks may change in a warming world with less snow.

By discerning patterns in satellite imagery, researchers hope to help national leaders and international agencies assist poverty-stricken regions.

A story on the impacts of climate change cites Marshall Burke's study on the relationship between climate and suicide and how it affects climate activism. 

Marshall Burke explains the economic cost of climate change in the United States.

Marshall Burke speaks about the effect of climate change on flooding.

“This is a well-researched and trustworthy [study] design for understanding the causal effects of changes in things like temperature on economic outcomes,” says Marshall Burke on a new study on the effects of temperature and learning.

Marshall Burke, assistant professor of Earth system science, explains how climate change may influence civil conflicts.

Researchers led by Stanford's Katharine Mach estimate that over the last century, climate has influenced up to 20 percent of armed conflict risk and that this percentage will increase dramatically.

As global temperatures climb, the risk of armed conflict is expected to increase substantially. Extreme weather and related disasters can damage economies, lower farming production and intensify inequality.

Stanford Earth's Marshall Burke talks with host Steve Curwood about how climate disruption is worsening global economic inequality.

Noah Diffenbaugh discusses how climate change has exacerbated global inequality, and how we can stop that vicious cycle.

Research by Stanford Earth professors Noah Diffenbaugh and Marshall Burke shows climate change is driving the wealth gap in more ways than we think.

Climate change has different effects on the economies of cold and warm countries. A new study by Stanford scientists finds it has already made poor warm countries substantially more poor.

Computing a precise social cost of carbon could help us decide how much to invest and which problems to tackle first. Research led by Marshall Burke on the dollar value of limiting warming to 1.5 °C is cited.

It's been well-documented that low-income communities bear the brunt of many climate change-related horrors. Now research from Stanford shows which countries win and which lose out as a result of global warming.

"Researchers and policy makers have been saying for many years that the greatest, most acute impacts of global warming are falling on populations least responsible for creating that global warming," says Noah Diffenbaugh. "We have quantified the effect."

Global warming's effects reach beyond the natural world. New research shows climate change has slowed progress toward narrowing the economic gap between the world’s richest and poorest nations.
 

Stanford Earth researchers have quantified the economic impact of climate change over half a century, revealing the extent to which global warming has made poor countries poorer and rich countries richer.

Global warming has already created winners and losers across the world, with poorer, tropical nations suffering the most even though they contributed far less to the problem, a study from Stanford Earth finds.

Climate change has already created a sobering patchwork of economic inequality across the globe, according to Stanford researchers Marshall Burke and Noah Diffenbaugh.

Numerous studies have predicted that poor nations will suffer the greatest devastation from climate change. A new analysis by Noah Diffenbaugh and Marshall Burke finds it’s already been happening for decades.

A rising tide may lift all boats. But when it comes to economic prosperity, the same can't be said for rising temperatures. That's the conclusion of a new study by Noah Diffenbaugh and Marshall Burke.

Soaring temperatures have enriched cooler, wealthier countries while dragging down economic growth in warmer nations, according to a new study by Marshall Burke and Noah Diffenbaugh.

The gap between the economic output of the world’s richest and poorest countries is 25 percent larger today than it would have been without global warming, according to new research from Stanford University.

Scientists have long predicted that warmer temperatures caused by climate change will have the biggest impact on the world’s poorest, most vulnerable people. New research indicates that’s already happened.

Stanford researchers say warmer temperatures are widening the chasm separating richer and poorer countries, effectively boosting the economies of many wealthy polluters while dampening growth in much of the developing world. 

New research by Stanford Earth's Marshall Burke and Noah Diffenbaugh shows that global warming has already imposed an economic penalty on many countries.

Climate change is having a serious impact on economic growth across the world – and it's worse for poor countries that already had a lot of catching up to do, according to a new study.

Climate change creates winners and losers. Norway is among the winners; Nigeria among the losers. Those are the stark findings of a peer-reviewed paper by Stanford professors Marshall Burke and Noah Diffenbaugh.

In warmer temperatures suicide rates increase, leading to concerns about an uptick in suicides as the globe continues to warm. But researchers offer some hope if greenhouse gases get under control.

“It’s absolutely the case that emissions and growth can be decoupled,” says Stanford Earth's Marshall Burke, whose research has shown the economic benefits of mitigation will be much larger than previously believed. 

Polluted air is the norm for many people around the world. Globally, long-term exposure to outdoor air pollution is responsible for millions of deaths.

Research led by Stanford Earth scientists shows that, contrary to the picture painted by President Trump on "60 minutes," not doing anything about climate change could cost trillions of dollars. 

Obscured behind better-known impacts of climate change lies the possibility of more wars, higher crime rates and greater infant mortality.

"As economic conditions worsen, that might also worsen mental health," Stanford Earth's Marshall Burke explains. There also might be "a plausible biological linkage between temperature, thermal regulation and how the brain regulates its own emotion."

Marshall Burke's recent study on the connection between suicide rates and temperature is cited in the context of additional research that exposure to heat, on average, worsens mental health outcomes.

Stanford Earth's Marshall Burke co-authored an influential study detailing the relationship between a country's average temperature and its per capita GDP.

Stanford Earth professor Marshall Burke discusses his work to determine just how connected suicide and excessively hot temperatures are.

Stanford experts discuss the linkages between climate change and health, an area that will be a focus of Stanford-led events at the Global Climate Action Summit in San Francisco.

A new study led by Stanford Earth's Marshall Burke sheds light on the relationship between above-average temperatures and rising suicide rates.

A hotter planet could lead to tens of thousands more suicides by 2050 in the U.S. and Mexico, unless global warming is curbed, a study led by Marshall Burke finds.

Global warming could lead to thousands of suicides over the next few decades, according to a study led by Stanford Earth's Marshall Burke.

Researchers led by Marshall Burke found a roughly linear relationship between temperature and suicide. Suicide rates go down in cooler months, and up in cooler ones.

By comparing historical temperature and suicide data, researchers found a strong correlation between warm weather and increased suicides.

Satellite measurements of air quality across sub-Saharan Africa revealed small improvements in air quality could be one of the most effective interventions to curb infant mortality rates.

Stanford scientists found that the global economy is likely to benefit from ambitious global warming limits agreed to in the United Nations Paris Agreement.

If asked to imagine a geologist, you might envision a tanned and dusty figure, hardy and weathered like the ancient rocks that he or she spends days studying out “in the field."

Stanford's new center includes Earth Systems Science professors David Lobell, Marshall Burke, Eric Lambin, Roz Naylor, and James Jones.

By using high-res images taken by the latest generation of compact satellites, Stanford scientists have developed a new capability for estimating crop yields from space. Measuring yields could improve productivity and eventually reduce hunger.

Gaps in social science knowledge of climate change constrain the policy impact of natural science research, a Stanford team argues.