BackgroundAir pollution is the greatest environmental threat to human health in the world today and is responsible for an estimated 7–9 million deaths annually. One of the most damaging air pollutants is PM2.5 pollution, fine airborne particulate matter under 2.5 microns in diameter. Exposure to PM2.5 pollution can cause premature death, heart disease, lung cancer, stroke, diabetes, asthma, low birthweight, and IQ loss. To avoid these adverse health effects, the WHO recommends that PM2.5 levels not exceed 5 μg/m3.MethodsThis study estimates the negative health impacts of PM2.5 pollution in Texas in 2016. Local exposure estimates were calculated at the census tract level using the EPA’s BenMAP-CE software. In BenMAP, a variety of exposure-response functions combine air pollution exposure data with population data and county-level disease and death data to estimate the number of health effects attributable to PM2.5 pollution for each census tract. The health effects investigated were mortality, low birthweight, stroke, new onset asthma, new onset Alzheimer’s, and non-fatal lung cancer.FindingsThis study found that approximately 26.7 million (98.9%) of the 27.0 million people living in Texas in 2016 resided in areas where PM2.5 concentrations were above the WHO recommendation of 5 μg/m3, and that 2.6 million people (9.8%) lived in areas where the average PM2.5 concentration exceeded 10 μg/m3. This study estimates that there were 8,405 (confidence interval [CI], 5,674–11,033) premature deaths due to PM2.5 pollution in Texas in 2016, comprising 4.3% of all deaths. Statewide increases in air-pollution-related morbidity and mortality were seen for stroke (2,209 – CI: [576, 3,776]), low birthweight (2,841 – CI: [1,696, 3,925]), non-fatal lung cancers (636 – CI: [219, 980]), new onset Alzheimer’s disease (24,575 – CI: [20,800, 27,540]), and new onset asthma (7,823 – CI: [7,557, 8,079]).ConclusionThis study found that air pollution poses significant risks to the health of Texans, despite the fact that pollution levels across most of the state comply with the EPA standard for PM2.5 pollution of 12 μg/m3. Improving air quality in Texas could save thousands of lives from disease, disability, and premature death.

The Texas Birth Defects Registry (TBDR) of the Texas Department of State Health Services (TDSHS) is an active surveillance system that maintains information on infants with structural and chromosomal birth defects born to mothers residing in Texas at the time of birth (Texas Department of State Health Services, 2019). TBDR staff review medical records to identify and abstract relevant case information, which then undergoes extensive quality checks (Texas Department of State Health Services, 2019). All diagnoses are made prenatally or within one year after delivery (Texas Department of State Health Services, 2019). Data on cases was obtained from the TBDR. Information on live births for the denominators and on covariates for cases and denominators was obtained from the Texas Department of State Health Services Center for Health Statistics. This research was approved by the Texas Department of State Health Services Institutional Review Board and US EPA Human Subjects Review. The Environmental Quality Index (EQI) estimates overall county-level environmental quality for the entire US for 2006-2010. The construction of the EQI is described elsewhere (United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2020). Briefly, the national data was compiled to represent simultaneous, cumulative environmental quality across each of the five domains: air (43 variables) representing criteria and hazardous air pollutants; water (51 variables), representing overall water quality, general water contamination, recreational water quality, drinking water quality, atmospheric deposition, drought, and chemical contamination; land (18 variables), representing agriculture, pesticides, contaminants, facilities, and radon; built (15 variables), representing roads, highway/road safety, public transit behavior, business environment, and subsidized housing environment; and sociodemographic (12 variables), representing socioeconomics and crime. The variables in each domain specific index were reduced using principal component analysis (PCA), with the first component retained as that domain’s index value. The domain specific indices were valence corrected to ensure that the directionality of the variables was consistent with higher values suggesting poorer environmental quality. The domain specific indices were then processed through a second PCA and the first index retained as the overall EQI. The overall and domain specific EQI indices are publicly available through the US EPA (United States Environmental Protection Agency: https://edg.epa.gov/data/Public/ORD/NHEERL/EQI). This dataset is not publicly accessible because: EPA cannot release personally identifiable information regarding living individuals, according to the Privacy Act and the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). This dataset contains information about human research subjects. Because there is potential to identify individual participants and disclose personal information, either alone or in combination with other datasets, individual level data are not appropriate to post for public access. Restricted access may be granted to authorized persons by contacting the party listed. It can be accessed through the following means: Human health data are not available publicly. EQI data are available at: https://edg.epa.gov/data/Public/ORD/NHEERL/EQI. Format: Data are stored as csv files. This dataset is associated with the following publication: Krajewski, A., K. Rappazzo, P. Langlois, L. Messer, and D. Lobdell. Associations between cumulative environmental quality and ten selected birth defects in Texas. Birth Defects Research. John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, NJ, USA, 113(2): 161-172, (2020).

Histograms of pollen counts. A. Original data. B. Log-transformed data. Fig. S2 Histograms of aeroallergen counts. A. Original data. B. Log-transformed data. Table S1 Descriptive statistics of asthma HAs, ambient O3, pollen, and meteorological factors in Dallas, Houston, and Austin, Texas, from 2003 to 2011. Table S2 Associationsa between asthma HAs and ambient O3 concentrations in Dallas, Houston, and Austin, Texas, from 2003 to 2011. Table S3 Associationsa between asthma HAs and ambient O3 concentrations, with adjustment for pollen, in Dallas, Houston, and Austin, Texas, from 2003 to 2011. Table S4 Associations between asthma HAs and ambient O3 concentrations, with adjustment for pollen using alternative dataa for Dallas. Table S5 Associations between asthma HAs and ambient O3 concentrations, with adjustments for pollen and respiratory infection HAs, in Dallas, Houston, and Austin, Texas, from 2003 to 2011. Table S6 Results of asthma HAs per 10 ppb increase in O3 concentrations, with adjustment for aeroallergen, in Dallas and Houston, Texas, from 2003 to 2011. Table S7 Sensitivity analyses with different specifications of temperature and dew point . Table S8 Sensitivity analysesa with different specifications of temporal trend. Table S9 Sensitivity analysesa with O3 concentrations at lag −1 day. Table S10 Associationsa between acute appendicitis HAs and ambient O3 in Dallas, Houston, and Austin, Texas, from 2003 to 2011. (XLSX 95 kb)

The city in the United States with the highest average PM2.5 concentration in 2024 was South Padre Island in Texas, at 21.6 micrograms per cubic meter of air (μg/m³). That year, Texas also featured another city in the top 10 ranking of most polluted cities in the North American country – Gilmer. Meanwhile, California's city of Shafter had the second-highest PM2.5 concentration, at about 16.1 μg/m³. The state of California typically suffers from high concentrations of PM2.5 due to the large number of wildfires that spread across the west coast of the United States, leaving many cities exposed to smoke.

Information from the TCEQ annual waste summary report form, including generator's registration number, the year of report, waste, total quantity generated, quantity handled and how the waste was handled. The report lists the generator's annual waste generation quantities and handling for hazardous and Industrial Class 1 waste.