How Do Household Energy Interventions Work?

This report, available for downloading below, presents an accountability study led by Jill Baumgartner and Sam Harper at McGill University. Baumgartner, Harper, and colleagues evaluated the effects on air quality and health of a clean heating policy that stipulated and subsidized the conversion of household heating from coal to electric heaters in Beijing region villages.

Key takeaways:

• The investigators visited 50 villages in winter and compared changes in air quality, indoor temperatures, and heart and lung health in 20 villages where the policy was implemented with 30 villages where it was not.
• Implementation of the clean heating policy was associated with reduced indoor fine particle concentrations, blood pressure, and respiratory symptoms. The results suggest that the policy’s impacts on blood pressure were largely attributable to improvements in air quality and indoor temperature.
• These results are encouraging for other countries seeking to implement policies to replace highly polluting residential heating sources.