Students investigate coal terminal’s impacts on air pollution in Baltimore’s Curtis Bay

Key takeaways:

• UMB’s new course urges students to tackle climate issues.
• Students found coal dust from CSX coal terminal affects nearby areas.
• They are using their findings to contest the terminal’s permit renewal.

Students and faculty from the University of Maryland, Baltimore, worked together in an innovative pilot course that led them to document a CSX coal terminal’s impact on air pollution on the Curtis Bay neighborhood.

They shared their findings with the Maryland Department of Environment (MDE), urging the agency to reject a permit renewal for the terminal to protect the health of neighborhood residents.

The pilot course

The “Climate Change, Health and Society” course offered by the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB), is taught by 12 UMB faculty and began as a pilot initiative in the spring of 2024, according to a university press release.

The class was open to students in the schools of law, medicine, nursing and social work as well as graduate students in the Marine-Estuarine Environmental Sciences (MEES) graduate program.

During the course, the 12 enrolled students experienced a series of 10 interdisciplinary classes that started with the science of climate change, its health impacts and laws and policy.

“We had three panels with stakeholders, community leaders and advocates meet the students and tell them how they are working in the climate space,” Shiladitya DasSarma, PhD, director of the course, told Healio.

“This was quite inspiring, and we continued to meet with them and other professionals during the summer internships,” DasSarma, who is also a professor in the department of microbiology and immunology in the University of Maryland School of Medicine, continued. “In each of the classes, students worked in teams to solve problems together and build relationships, irrespective of professional goals.”

DasSarma further explained that during the term, each of the four three-student teams identified a problem they wanted to solve, wrote a proposal and paper with a possible solution, and then presented them to the faculty and students in the class.

One of the student groups began to work on a project that examined Baltimore’s Curtis Bay neighborhood and the effects that the nearby CSX coal terminal may have on the neighborhood’s health and environment.

In 2023, a collaboration between the University of Maryland department of atmospheric and oceanic science and other state government and advocacy stakeholders conducted an investigation and found that coal dust was present throughout Curtis Bay, that its presence correlated with wind direction and activity at the CSX coal terminal, and the neighborhood is overburdened by air pollution.

Their report included dust collection and analysis, monitoring of particulate matter, sampling and resident testimonials. Coal particles were found in 100% of samples from eight different locations at three different collection rounds. Locations varied from the edge of the coal terminal to three-quarters of a mile from it. Pollution was also recorded as a result of diesel truck traffic.

From left, Leonardo Soto, Joyce Wang, Garrett Posey.

“The Curtis Bay group, which included a science student (Leonardo Soto), medical student (Joyce Wang), and law student (Garrett Posey), was the most engaged and made a lot of progress with a letter writing campaign,” DasSarma said.

Posey, a juris doctor candidate at University of Maryland Carey Law School, explained that students were asked to assemble interdisciplinary teams based on their shared interests in local climate issues for which they could produce solutions.

“Leo, Joyce and I shared interests in emission and pollution remediation and quickly focused our attention on a profound issue facing an overburdened community in South Baltimore: CSX’s coal storage facility in Curtis Bay,” he said. “The facility ships coal across the world, warming the planet while making a profit.”

Posey said his group chose this topic was due to the course’s structure. Each student focused on bringing together research in their area of knowledge so that they could find a more comprehensive solution than any one of them standing alone.

“The solution we chose was submitting a comment during the site’s permit approval process,” he said. “We hoped to assist in the push to eliminate this key link in global emissions while fighting for an end to the burden of respiratory diseases and air quality facing Curtis Bay.”

Throughout the project, the group of students collaborated and wove together their arguments.

“We included Leo’s research into how the coal dust posed problems for the environment and human welfare, Joyce’s understanding of the real health impacts of coal dust on the ground, and my explanation of why these facts under Maryland law necessitated an end to the facility,” he said.

They turned their research into a paper and presented it to the class. They then submitted their findings to MDE after the semester ended, according to Posey.

“We eagerly await the result of this process with a stronger appreciation for how interdisciplinary efforts strengthen responses to problems,” he said.

After the spring course ended, they followed up with a summer internship in order to implement the solutions for their projects. According to DasSarma, other projects included weighing the impacts a proposed east-west commuter Red Line, mitigating heat stress impacts, and overcoming Baltimore’s waterfront flooding challenges from storms and aging infrastructure.

The findings

The students found a significant presence of coal dust in the Curtis Bay neighborhood. They used their research to argue against CSX’s response to the MDE’s collaborative report that showed the dust’s impact on the surrounding area.

“In their response to the report, CSX argues that the ‘putative coal dust’ discussed in the MDE report is not coal dust and that the white tape experiments provide no value to the study,” Wang, a medical student at the University of Maryland Medical School, told Healio.

“We disprove these points by demonstrating that existing scientific literature corroborates the coal dust composition in the MDE report and that the white tape data indicate increasing coal dust accumulation with both increased time and proximity to the facility,” Wang continued.

Soto, a student in the MEES program, explained that detailed scientific methods such as tape lifts and passive ambient particle accumulation have confirmed the presence of high levels of coal particles near the CSX terminal and residential areas. He said the terminal also contributes to climate change by releasing coal dust particles as well as other pollutants into the atmosphere.

“The handling and transportation of coal at the terminal generates windblown dust that affects the air quality of surrounding communities,” Soto added. “This contributes to a localized pollution burden and is part of the larger issue of fossil fuel-driven climate change.

“The coal exported through this terminal represents emissions equivalent to about 70% of Maryland’s annual carbon dioxide emissions, underscoring its significant role in contributing to global climate change,” he continued. “So, the emissions from Maryland would be considerably higher if the burning of this coal was taken into account. And of course, the coal is burned when it reaches its destination.”

Wang commented on the actions of the state of Maryland and its climate goals by allowing CSX to continue operations in Curtis Bay.

“The Climate Solutions Now Act wants to reduce emissions by 60% of 2008 levels by 2031, to net-zero by 2045,” she said. “Gov. Wes Moore has signed multiple executive orders calling for changes in infrastructure and policy to address climate change.”

Wang emphasized that even though there has yet to be a study relating Curtis Bay community health to CSX’s operations, a variety of scientific literature exists that demonstrates the damaging effects of coal dust.

“For decades, exposure to coal particles has been associated with the development of lung diseases such as ‘black lung’ (coal worker’s pneumoconiosis), which results in irreversible loss of lung function,” she said. “Coal dust exposure has also been shown to cause DNA damage and trace amounts of toxic heavy metals in the urine of coal workers.”

Coal workers with black lung have higher rates of gastric cancer, whereas coal dust exposure is also associated with higher rates of cardiovascular conditions, according to Wang.

“More research is emerging that also suggests there are implications for ocular health; namely, higher rates of dry eye and glaucoma,” she said. “Many of these disease processes are believed to involve endothelial dysfunction and oxidative stress, which can be triggered by coal dust particles.”

A 2017 Carnegie Melon study cited by the student group showed that communities living in proximity to open-air coal piles have higher adult and infant mortality rates as well as harm from the exposure to toxic industrial waste. The effects include endocrine disruption, birth defects and inflammatory diseases.

Taking action

Within the students’ recommendations to the MDE to dissuade the state agency from renewing CSX’s permit renewal, several legal points were included that are still being considered.

As a law student, Posey wrote up many of the legal arguments against CSX’s renewal.

One of the major points was housing. According to Posey, Curtis Bay residents have few options to leave because of a lack of affordable housing in the city. He said MDE is obliged to provide Maryland residents with a clean environment.

He also noted CSX’s legal responsibility of taking reasonable precaution to guard against airborne dust. The project group argues that the company failed to do so. CSX is also obligated to not create a nuisance in the form of air pollution.

By allowing coal particles to travel into the neighborhood, CSX interferes with the enjoyment of the residents’ properties so “substantially and unreasonably,” Posey argued, that the intrusion is offensive or inconvenient to the ordinary person.

“CSX should not have been allowed to receive the administrative extension,” he said, “because these permit violations were ongoing.”

Posey added that MDE can reject permits if a company fails to comply with regulations.

The students emphasized that MDE is responsible for ensuring a permit process that keeps the degree of air purity necessary to protect the property, welfare and health of Maryland residents.

“MDE is never legally required to deny a permit,” Posey said. “But, because the CSX facility harms the health of Curtis Bay’s residents, MDE should make a permissive, pro-climate justice decision in favor of Marylanders and wield the permit process in a manner that protects Curtis Bay by denying the permit.”

Faculty training program

As a result of the success of the course, faculty at UMB formed the climate change, health and society training program.

“The enormity of climate change, and we have seen it over the past two summers with the unprecedented wildfires and storms, needs an all-hands-on deck approach,” DasSarma said.

“We all want to help, especially our professional and science students, and so we all need to learn the fundamentals of climate change and how to work together in effective teams,” he continued. “Only through effective teamwork will we be able to enact the changes we need to make.”

The university will work on building an education model that includes an interdisciplinary center and a variety of courses focusing on climate change and health.

“I hope that the students appreciate both the scope of the problems and that 80% to 85% of the solutions are in hand,” DasSarma said. “We just need to have the ambition to make the right decisions and reap the rewards which are better health and more equitable society. I hope that they also learn how to interact and collaborate across fields and work toward a common goal, developing innovative ideas, solutions and friendships in the process.”

Future of the course

Course instructors hope to find stakeholders to support future student internships and to expand the projects.

“We have talked about having the course and internship program as the core of an Interprofessional Center for Climate Change Education (we call ‘ICE-cubed’) and are actively seeking support for this goal,” DasSarma said. “Our sights are long-term, since climate change is a permanent problem that we will all need to address over the coming decades.”

DasSarma emphasized that the close proximity of UMB’s professional programs makes it easier for faculty and students to collaborate.

“The medical school is caddy-corner to the law school and across the street from the nursing school,” he said. “It makes it easy for us to get together.”

CSX coal terminal response

CSX responded to Healio’s request for comment after sharing the findings of UMB’s pilot course.

“CSX is committed to environmental compliance and strives to protect the environment and the safety and health of the public, our customers and employees in all aspects of our operations,” a CSX spokesperson said.

The spokesperson noted CSX’s 200-year history in Baltimore’s Curtis Bay neighborhood and an investment of more than $60 million over the last 5 years to “advance long-term operational safety, improve dust control and collect 100% of storm water for onsite reuse at our facility.”

References:

• Collaborative investigation of coal dust, air pollution, and health concerns in Curtis Bay, South Baltimore, Maryland, USA, 2022-2023. https://mde.maryland.gov/programs/permits/AirManagementPermits/Documents/FINAL_Full_CB%20Collab_%20Report.pdf. Published Dec. 14, 2023. Accessed Oct. 17, 2024.
• UMB working to combat climate change’s impact on health. https://www.umaryland.edu/news/archived-news/september-2024/umb-working-to-combat-climate-changes-impact-health.php#:~:text=Through%20a%20uniquely%20interdisciplinary%20approach,reduce%20climate%20and%20health%20inequities. Published Sept. 13, 2024. Accessed Oct. 17, 2024.
• Jha A, et al. Working paper No. 23417. https://www.nber.org/papers/w23417. Published May 2017. Accessed Nov. 10, 2024.
• Collaborative Investigation of Coal Dust, Air Pollution, and Health Concerns in Curtis Bay, South Baltimore, Maryland, USA, 2022-2023. https://mde.maryland.gov/programs/permits/AirManagementPermits/Documents/FINAL_Full_CB%20Collab_%20Report.pdf. Published Dec. 14, 2023. Accessed Nov. 10, 2024.

For more information:

Shiladitya DasSarma, PhD, and members of The Curtis Bay Group can be reached at echappell@umaryland.edu.