berk power plant.jpg

Agawam Mayor Richard Cohen is asking state lawmakers to file legislation to require cities that host power plants to receive compensation from any future legal financial settlements with facilities that violate emission standards or other environmental regulations.

(Don Treeger / The Republican File Photo)

A state carbon fee aimed at decreasing pollution would save $2.9 billion in health benefits and 340 lives between now and 2040, according to a new Harvard University study commissioned by environmental groups.

"It's a report showing that instituting a carbon fee in Massachusetts can have substantial benefits to public health through improving air quality," said Jonathan Buonocore, a professor at the Harvard School of Public Health and the study's lead author.

The study is based on the projected decrease in air pollution generated by a carbon fee. Other policies that decrease greenhouse gas emissions and pollution could have similar health benefits. The amount of health benefits depends on how much fossil fuel use is reduced, the type of fuel and the location of the reduction.

Environmental groups concerned about climate change have been pushing for the state to put a price on carbon. That would raise the price of energy, but the money could be returned to residents through some kind of rebate. The goal would be to encourage people to use less energy.

Carbon pricing bills have gotten additional support between the last legislative session, when they failed to advance, and this year. But since lawmakers just passed a major energy procurement bill last year, the chance of another major change to the energy industry remain slim.

Sen. Michael Barrett, D-Lexington, chairman of the Joint Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities and Energy, is sponsoring a carbon pricing bill for the third time this legislative session. He has gotten 64 cosponsors and hopes to continue to build support for the policy.

Barrett said the study "packs an emotional punch," since people tend to be more able to relate to health impacts than environmental ones. There also tends to be less literature available about health effects of pollution and global warming.

"A good deal of the time people react in a visceral way to threats to their health that go right along with the environmental impacts," Barrett said. "You talk about asthma and heart attacks and respiratory conditions, and people see the immediate relevance of that even when the environmental impacts of CO2 strike some as a little more abstract."

Environmental groups are likely to use this study to marshal support for their efforts. Advocates for carbon pricing say although it will raise the price of energy, lawmakers should consider external factors like public health when deciding whether to institute a carbon fee.

"This is the first study of state level outcomes from state level carbon pricing," said Rebecca Morris, a spokeswoman for the Massachusetts Campaign for a Clean Energy Future.

Under the carbon fee envisioned by pending bills, the study estimates that between 2017 and 2040, there could be 340 lives saved from minimizing the health impacts of pollution, 20 heart attacks avoided, and 54 hospitalizations avoided for respiratory or cardiovascular disease.

The study finds that this translates to $2.9 billion in health benefits, based on a calculation of how much each saved life is worth. That number does not include the savings from health improvements for things like asthma and other illnesses.

"It's not the first study to show good health benefits of things that are good for the environment," Buonocore said. For example, studies have shown health benefits from cleaner power plants.

The calculations are based on a legislative proposal to start pricing carbon at $10 a ton and gradually increase that to $40 a ton.

The study was paid for by the Merck Family Fund, which gives grants to environmental nonprofits, the Clean Water Fund, and private donations. It was conducted by professors at Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health, a Boston University professor and economic consultants.

It is being released at an event Thursday at the Boston Foundation with climate change and environmental groups.