April 28, 2022

Sacrifice Zones: ProPublica Takes Us Inside America’s Toxic Hotspots

40 minutes

All across the United States, industrial polluters are emitting toxic air... and people who live near those polluters are breathing it in. Kendra spoke to journalists from investigative newsroom ProPublica about the communities most affected by carcinogenic air pollution, often referred to as “sacrifice zones”: where they are, why they matter, and how you can find out if you and your loved ones are living in one.

Guests: Al Shaw, Maya Miller, John Beard Jr.

Calls to Action:

If you want to learn more about Propublica’s series and the sacrifice zones they studied, you can see the entire project on their site here. If you’re interested in finding out whether the place YOU live is on ProPublica’s map, you can see that, too— just search this map by address, city, or zipcode, and see the industrial pollution risks in your area.

The EPA data that Propublica’s investigative team used when they made the site is from the Risk-Screening Environmental Indicators model. You can check it out for yourself here.

Finally, if you’re interested in going beyond just industrial pollution, Al recommends looking at a database called the National Air Toxics Assessment, put out by the EPA.

Check out our Calls to Action archive for all of the actions we've recommended on the show. Send us your ideas or feedback with our Listener Mail Form. Sign up for our newsletter here. And follow us on Twitter and Instagram.

This episode was produced by Hannah Chinn. Our star moderator, is Kendra Pierre-Louis. The rest of our reporting and producing team includes Anna Ladd, Rachel Waldholz, Daniel Ackerman, and Meg Driscoll. Our supervising producer is Katelyn Bogucki. Our editor is Caitlin Kenney. Our fact checker for this episode is James Gaines. Sound design and mixing by Peter Leonard.

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