Air Pollution is Harming Health and Cleaner Trucks will Drastically Reduce Pollution

Katherine E. Goff & Dr. Sheela Mahnke • August 24, 2022

Katherine E. Goff & Dr. Sheela Mahnke urge the Air Quality Control Commission (AQCC) to adopt the Advanced Clean Trucks Rule

A new normal has emerged in Colorado. Every summer, when temperatures are at their hottest, people across the state have come to expect that hazy air will compromise our ability to breathe comfortably, to see the mountains in the distance, and to enjoy the outdoor recreation that folks from around the world travel long distances just to experience. While some might see this as a mild annoyance, health professionals see a threat that’s far more insidious to the people of Colorado: our polluted air is killing us. 


When people think of Colorado, the image that springs to mind is that of a wide open, beautiful western landscape with crisp, clean mountain air. Unfortunately, that vision is nothing more than a fantasy for the vast majority of those who live in the state. Our communities here in Adams County, and Commerce City in particular, know this all too well as the 80216 zip code – home to 2 major interstates and a number of industrial polluters – has been called the most polluted zip code in the U.S. 


The rest of Colorado hardly fares much better. Recently, the American Lung Association released their State of the Air Report for 2022, and their findings are grim. Colorado is home to two of the 25 most polluted cities in America in Denver and Ft. Collins, and a number of counties across the state were given failing grades due to the level of pollution in their air. 


Allowing our air to reach this state of contamination comes at a major cost to our health, especially for the most vulnerable populations, which include children, the elderly, those with asthma, COPD, cardiovascular disease and pregnant women. Air pollution increases the risk of severe complications for those with respiratory illnesses like asthma and COPD. In Adams County alone there are almost 10,000 children with asthma who suffer daily from the toxic effects of our air. Poor air quality even harms the fetus prior to birth, resulting in lower birth weights and places healthy children at risk for increased respiratory infections and poor lung development. 


Although there is no silver bullet that will allow us to eliminate air pollution overnight, there is concrete action our leaders can take to reduce emissions and protect our health. One of the most immediate remedies available is for the Air Quality Control Commission (AQCC) to adopt the Advanced Clean Trucks Rule, which would require manufacturers of medium- and heavy-duty vehicles to steadily increase their sales of zero emissions trucks over time.


Most of us have had the experience of sitting in congested traffic behind a truck spewing clouds of black smoke and had the thought that those emissions must be terrible for the environment. If you’ve had that thought, you were right: in the Denver Metro area, medium and heavy-duty vehicles contribute 24.3% of on-road NOx emissions despite accounting for less than 2% of vehicle miles traveled. These diesel emissions are costly for our health.


While these numbers are staggering, we cannot simply remove trucks from the road as the goods that they transport are essential to our way of life. Luckily, we don’t need to eradicate trucks altogether as the technology to drastically reduce health-harming diesel emissions from trucks is already here. A transition to clean trucks would have a transformative impact on our air quality generally, but especially for communities like Northglenn. My residents live near an interstate highway and suffer from transportation pollution they have no control over.


The urgency of adopting this rule as quickly as possible has become even more apparent in light of recent news that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may partially deny a similar effort in California. If this decision holds, Colorado would need to provide at least four years of lead time to implement our own Advanced Clean Trucks rule. Every day that the AQCC waits puts us further away from cleaning up our air by reducing emissions from trucks.


But this vital transition will not happen without action from the AQCC. The members of the commission must recognize that a failure to act immediately will cost Colorado dearly in hospital visits, lost work days, long term health conditions, and ultimately, it will cost people their lives. The AQCC needs to act immediately by instituting the Advanced Clean Trucks rule in order to ensure that every Coloradan can feel secure that the air they breathe isn’t leading them to a hospital, onto a ventilator, or into an early grave.


Katherine E. Goff, is a Northglenn Council Member & Dr. Sheela Mahnke is a pediatrician and advocate for Healthy Air & Water Colorado

HAWC Update - Greetings from our new ED Alex Boian

By HAWC Colorado • March 3, 2025
Hello HAWC Advocates and Friends! As I begin my third week as the new executive director of Healthy Air and Water Colorado, I wanted to send this brief note to introduce myself and express my gratitude to all of you in HAWC’s network of climate advocates and health professionals. My first few days have been filled with listening, learning, and getting to know many of you, your interests, and the incredible work you do to address climate change in order to protect public health. I join HAWC after more than 20 years in federal and state public policy working on natural resource issues, land use, sustainability, and in collaboration with local communities to ensure equitable access to clean and healthy air and water in Colorado, and across the country. Throughout my work, one thing has always been true, and that is the tremendous power of passionate individuals who come together, a coalition united by a common cause seeking real and lasting change. The HAWC network and our partners in climate advocacy are the coalition that is needed now more than ever to take action and advocate for policies that address the health impacts of worsening air quality, extreme temperatures, and threats to water availability and quality. I am thankful to each of you for the work you do every day at the crossroads of public health and climate policy, and for the time, energy, and enthusiasm you contribute. We are planning some in-person events and advocacy trainings so we have an opportunity to connect with you all and energize our work going forward. Stay tuned for more. I look forward to joining you in the work ahead! With gratitude, Alex Boian Executive Director Healthy Air and Water Colorado

Press Release: Colorado Takes Important Step in Cutting Methane Pollution, But More Action is Needed

By HAWC Colorado • February 26, 2025
Colorado air quality leaders vote in favor of cutting oil & gas emissions

The Harrowing Health Impacts of Transportation Pollution

By Megan Kemp - HAWC Advocacy Manager • November 17, 2022
Health professionals across Colorado see it daily: our poor air quality is having debilitating and sometimes deadly impacts on our communities. While they understand it in the aggregate, they are experiencing it one patient at a time. Kids with higher rates of asthma. Adults who are forced to stay indoors during the summer heat or wildfire season because underlying conditions make it impossible for them to breathe. People who can no longer effectively manage their diabetes due to rising temperatures. More babies born prematurely or at low birth weights. The reality is that the impacts of climate change aren’t just showing up in large scale changes in the frequency and severity of storms and the creeping changes to our seasonal weather patterns, the impacts of climate change are literally written on our bodies. For historically red-lined communities that have ended up along neighborhood destroying highways, these impacts increase exponentially. A major driver of this climate change and the concentric circles of public health distress is transportation, the cars we drive and the trucks that transport our goods and services. If we can bend the curve on transportation, we can make a significant difference in the quality of our air and the ground level ozone that debilitates so many and adds to the real challenges to our public health. Pollution from transportation typically comes in two forms and impacts public health in different ways. Particulate pollution from vehicle tailpipes can result in premature death in people with heart or lung disease, heart attacks and irregular heartbeat, aggravated asthma and other respiratory symptoms, such as irritation of the airways, coughing or difficulty breathing. These challenges can be particularly pronounced in the very young and the very old.

Press Release: Health Experts Press for Federal Action on Climate Change

October 27, 2022
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Oct. 27, 2022 Contact: Michele Ames 303-817-5510 Healthy Air & Water Colorado advocates press for federal action on climate change Listening session with Congressman Jason Crow focuses on high-impact policy change (DENVER, Oct. 27, 2022) – Health expert advocates on the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus discussed their concerns about the worsening public health crisis driven by climate change with U.S. Congressman Jason Crow on Wednesday. The event was hosted by Healthy Air & Water Colorado and the University of Colorado School of Medicine and University of Colorado Climate & Health Program. Healthy Air & Water Colorado, a sister organization of Healthier Colorado, the state’s leading health advocacy organization with over 100,000 members, helps health professionals from across the state speak out on policies that will help to curb the acceleration of climate change and reduce its current impacts on human health. Advocates working with the organization addressed policy they would like the federal government to pursue to help bend the curve on the worst health impacts of climate change. "When I think about what climate change is, it’s a child health issue. It’s not just about the polar bears, it’s about the health of our children,” said Dr. Bhargavi Chekuri, Assistant Professor of Family Medicine and Director of Continuing Medical Education at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. Chekuri and other health experts shared their experience in dealing with climate related health impacts with the congressman. The clinical and scientific data has confirmed increases in various climate-related diseases including increases in childhood asthma rates, increases in chronic lung ailments, growing difficulty managing chronic issues like diabetes, increasing rates of preterm births and decreasing birth weights, to name a few. In addition, medical professionals are also dealing with the immediate, catastrophic impacts of the increasing severity of storms and the growing frequency and veracity of wild fires across western states. Among other policy priorities at the federal level aimed at combatting these health impacts, Healthy Air & Water Colorado advocates have been pressing for ongoing investments in the country’s green energy infrastructure, transportation alternatives to help reduce fossil fuel emissions from cars and trucks, a leading cause of greenhouse gas and federal adoption of Colorado’s methane emission standards, which are the toughest in the nation. “When individuals have access to affordable and quality health care, it creates healthy and resilient communities. It’s going to take healthy resilient communities to address climate change and the health impacts,” said Dr. Kyle Leggott, assistant Professor of Family Medicine and policy scholar at the Farley Health Policy Center on the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. ### About Healthy Air & Water Colorado Healthy Air & Water Colorado is the only statewide advocate for public policy that focuses exclusively on the growing public health threats posed by climate change. The effort is a sister organization of Healthier Colorado, which is dedicated to policy solutions that give all Coloradans the chance to live healthier lives. By engaging frontline health care workers who see and treat the real health issues caused by our warming environment, we are combining fact-based research with clinical expertise to raise awareness and encourage action to advance policies that will help to avert our growing public health emergency.

Effective Wildfire Mitigation Requires Long-term, Sustainable Investment

By Tamara Pogue • April 13, 2022
Summit County Commissioner Tamara Pogue explains how the success of Summit County's model for long-term wildfire mitigation funding can be a model for preventing wildfire danger across Colorado

Colorado Should Incentivize Long Term Mitigation Strategies to Protect Communities from Wildfires

March 23, 2022
Out of control wildfires are threatening the health of every Coloradan

Statewide Rules Needed to Protect Public Health From Air Toxics

March 15, 2022
The science is clear. Air toxics damage our health. So why doesn't Colorado do more to regulate the pollution in the first place?

A Health Crisis - Colorado's Air Quality

August 16, 2021
We’ve got a problem, Colorado: our air is downright dirty.

2021 Legislative Session Victories | Climate & Health

June 15, 2021
The 2021 Colorado Legislative Session has officially come to an end. This past session, we made significant progress on mitigating the worst health impacts of climate change.

Colorado Roadmap to curb greenhouse gas falls short on equity for communities most impacted by pollution

March 12, 2021
As Colorado works to put in place robust measures to curb greenhouse gas, the largest contributor to warming around the globe, it must not leave behind the communities most impacted by pollution through negative health impacts. Colorado released its Greenhouse Gas Pollution Reduction Roadmap in September 2020 with a promise to return with a framework for ensuring equity for communities disproportionately impacted by the worst health effects of climate change due to financial inequity, structural racism and health inequities that have caused underlying health conditions as well as economic factors such as job loss and transition caused by shifts away from extraction. The equity framework was released in February 2021. It lays out the plan for state departments to communicate, engage, and partner with affected individuals and communities. While this is an important piece of protecting these communities, it falls short of capturing more tangible ways communities can reduce the impact of polluters and begin to address the health disparities pollution causes in their neighborhoods and homes. In May 2019, Governor Polis both signed into law the Colorado Action Plan to Reduce Pollution Act which set greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets and directed state agencies to develop a plan for how to meet these targets. The roadmap was designed to help the state meet its stated goal of reducing greenhouse gas by 50 percent by 2030 and 90 percent by 2050, an aggressive but attainable goal if strong action is taken soon. Some of the concrete steps taken in the draft equity framework include a data viewer model that will help the state prioritize disproportionately impacted communities, a new Climate Equity subcommittee that will oversee state strategies and rules that pertain to cutting emissions and a Climate and Equity data dashboard that will come online in 2021 to track equity and greenhouse gas emissions reduction progress. During the release of the roadmap, HAWC urged policymakers to return with a comprehensive equity framework. “We know that many communities across the state are subjected to disproportionate exposures to pollution,” HAWC said in a statement on the release. “The roadmap must make that reality clear and then address that reality with clear policy to specifically aid those communities and hold their polluters responsible. We also know that the needed transitions away from increased oil and gas development will have real impacts on local economies and Colorado workers. The roadmap should also address policies that will help those working families and individual communities make the transition to new industries and new jobs.“ HAWC appreciates some of the concepts and ideas contained in the framework, but doesn’t think it provides enough tangible benefits for the communities that have long been subject to environmental racism that has eroded local economies and generationally worsened health of affected communities. In addition, HAWC believes the original public comment timeframe to hear back from frontline communities -- just three weeks -- is not adequate to allow constructive feedback on the draft, and directly conflicts with the recommendations from the Equity Framework itself. HAWC joined a request with WildEarth Guardians calling on the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment to extend at least another month and applaud the department for granting that request to increase the feedback period to April 5. Please take a moment to urge CDPHE to include more tangible benefits and actionable steps to repair the harms of historial environmental racism in our frontline communities. You can read the equity framework . You can provide feedback to CDPHE on the equity framework. You can read the full Green House Gas Reduction Roadmap . You can read an executive summary of the roadmap .The body content of your post goes here. To edit this text, click on it and delete this default text and start typing your own or paste your own from a different source.
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