Producing materials such as steel, plastics and cement in the United States alone inflicts $79 billion a year in climate-related damage around the world, according to a new study by engineers and economists at the University of California, Davis.
Producing materials such as steel, plastics and cement in the United States alone inflicts $79 billion a year in climate-related damage around the world, according to a new study by engineers and economists at the University of California, Davis. Accounting for these costs in market prices could encourage progress toward climate-friendly alternatives.
“We wanted to look at the cost to society to produce these materials,” said Elisabeth Van Roijen, a recent Ph.D. graduate from the UC Davis Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and lead author on the paper, published Oct. 24 in Environmental Research Letters.
Van Roijen, undergraduate researcher Paikea Colligan and postdoctoral researcher Seth Kane set out to calculate the missing climate costs for producing nine common materials: aluminum, iron and steel, brick, cement, lime, gypsum, asphalt, glass and plastics.
Read More: University of California - Davis
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