Nber working paper series exposures and behavioral responses to wildfire smoke

The impacts of environmental change on human outcomes often depend on local exposures and behavioral responses that are challenging to observe with traditional administrative or sensor data. We show how data from private pollution sensors, cell phones, social media posts, and internet search activity yield new insights on exposures and behavioral responses during large wildfire smoke events across the US, a rapidly-growing environmental stressor. Health-protective behavior, mobility, and sentiment all respond to increasing ambient wildfire smoke concentrations, but responses differ by income. Indoor pollution monitors provide starkly different estimates of likely personal exposure during smoke events than would be inferred from traditional ambient outdoor sensors, with similar outdoor pollution levels generating >20x differences in average indoor PM2.5 concentrations. Our results suggest that the current policy reliance on self protection to mitigate health risks in the face of rising smoke exposure will result in modest and unequal benefits. Marshall Burke Department of Earth System Science Stanford University Stanford, CA 94305 and NBER mburke@stanford.edu Sam Heft-Neal Center on Food Security and the Environment Stanford University 473 Via Ortega Stanford, CA 94305 sheftneal@stanford.edu Jessica Li Center on Food Security and the Environment Stanford University 473 Via Ortega Stanford, CA 94305 jbli@stanford.edu Anne Driscoll Stanford University 616 Serra St Stanford, CA 94305 annedriscoll@cmu.edu Patrick W. Baylis Vancouver School of Economics University of British Columbia 6000 Iona Drive Vancouver, BC V6T1L4 Canada patrick.baylis@ubc.ca Matthieu Stigler Stanford University Y2E2 Building Stanford, CA 94305 mstigler@stanford.edu Joakim Weill Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics University of California, Davis One Shields Ave Davis, CA 95616 jweill@ucdavis.edu Jennifer Burney University of California San Diego 9500 Gilman Dr. #0519 La Jolla, CA 92093 jburney@ucsd.edu Jeff Wen Department of Earth System Science Stanford University 473 Via Ortega Stanford, CA 94305 jlwen@stanford.edu Marissa Childs Stanford University marissac@stanford.edu Carlos Gould Department of Earth System Science Stanford University 473 Via Ortega Stanford, CA 94305 cfgould@stanford.edu