Dataset Information

Assessing the health risks of natural CO2 seeps in Italy.

ABSTRACT: Industrialized societies which continue to use fossil fuel energy sources are considering adoption of Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) technology to meet carbon emission reduction targets. Deep geological storage of CO(2) onshore faces opposition regarding potential health effects of CO(2) leakage from storage sites. There is no experience of commercial scale CCS with which to verify predicted risks of engineered storage failure. Studying risk from natural CO(2) seeps can guide assessment of potential health risks from leaking onshore CO(2) stores. Italy and Sicily are regions of intense natural CO(2) degassing from surface seeps. These seeps exhibit a variety of expressions, characteristics (e.g., temperature/flux), and location environments. Here we quantify historical fatalities from CO(2) poisoning using a database of 286 natural CO(2) seeps in Italy and Sicily. We find that risk of human death is strongly influenced by seep surface expression, local conditions (e.g., topography and wind speed), CO(2) flux, and human behavior. Risk of accidental human death from these CO(2) seeps is calculated to be 10-8 year-1 to the exposed population. This value is significantly lower than that of many socially accepted risks. Seepage from future storage sites is modeled to be less that Italian natural flux rates. With appropriate hazard management, health risks from unplanned seepage at onshore storage sites can be adequately minimized.

SUBMITTER: Roberts JJ

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3189059 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Assessing the health risks of natural CO2 seeps in Italy.

Roberts Jennifer J JJ Wood Rachel A RA Haszeldine R Stuart RS

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 20110912 40

Industrialized societies which continue to use fossil fuel energy sources are considering adoption of Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) technology to meet carbon emission reduction targets. Deep geological storage of CO(2) onshore faces opposition regarding potential health effects of CO(2) leakage from storage sites. There is no experience of commercial scale CCS with which to verify predicted risks of engineered storage failure. Studying risk from natural CO(2) seeps can guide assessment of pot ...[more]

PMID: 21911398

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Project description:BackgroundNatural gas contains methane and the gaseous alkanes ethane, propane and butane, which collectively influence atmospheric chemistry and cause global warming. Methane-oxidising bacteria, methanotrophs, are crucial in mitigating emissions of methane as they oxidise most of the methane produced in soils and the subsurface before it reaches the atmosphere. Methanotrophs are usually obligate, i.e. grow only on methane and not on longer chain alkanes. Bacteria that grow on the other gaseous alkanes in natural gas such as propane have also been characterised, but they do not grow on methane. Recently, it was shown that the facultative methanotroph Methylocella silvestris grew on ethane and propane, other components of natural gas, in addition to methane. Therefore, we hypothesised that Methylocella may be prevalent at natural gas seeps and might play a major role in consuming all components of this potent greenhouse gas mixture before it is released to the atmosphere.ResultsEnvironments known to be exposed to biogenic methane emissions or thermogenic natural gas seeps were surveyed for methanotrophs. 16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing revealed that Methylocella were the most abundant methanotrophs in natural gas seep environments. New Methylocella-specific molecular tools targeting mmoX (encoding the soluble methane monooxygenase) by PCR and Illumina amplicon sequencing were designed and used to investigate various sites. Functional gene-based assays confirmed that Methylocella were present in all of the natural gas seep sites tested here. This might be due to its ability to use methane and other short chain alkane components of natural gas. We also observed the abundance of Methylocella in other environments exposed to biogenic methane, suggesting that Methylocella has been overlooked in the past as previous ecological studies of methanotrophs often used pmoA (encoding the alpha subunit of particulate methane monooxygenase) as a marker gene.ConclusionNew biomolecular tools designed in this study have expanded our ability to detect, and our knowledge of the environmental distribution of Methylocella, a unique facultative methanotroph. This study has revealed that Methylocella are particularly abundant at natural gas seeps and may play a significant role in biogeochemical cycling of gaseous hydrocarbons.

Project description:BackgroundHealth care databases contain a wealth of information that can be used to develop programs and mature health care systems. There is concern that the sensitive nature of health data (eg, ethnicity, reproductive health, sexually transmitted infections, and lifestyle information) can have significant impact on individuals if misused, particularly among vulnerable and marginalized populations. As academic institutions, nongovernmental organizations, and international agencies begin to collaborate with low- and middle-income countries to develop and deploy health information technology (HIT), it is important to understand the technical and practical security implications of these initiatives.ObjectiveOur aim is to develop a conceptual framework for risk stratification of global health data partnerships and HIT projects. In addition to identifying key conceptual domains, we map each domain to a variety of publicly available indices that could be used to inform a quantitative model.MethodsWe conducted an overview of the literature to identify relevant publications, position statements, white papers, and reports. The research team reviewed all sources and used the framework method and conceptual framework analysis to name and categorize key concepts, integrate them into domains, and synthesize them into an overarching conceptual framework. Once key domains were identified, public international data sources were searched for relevant structured indices to generate quantitative counterparts.ResultsWe identified 5 key domains to inform our conceptual framework: State of HIT, Economics of Health Care, Demographics and Equity, Societal Freedom and Safety, and Partnership and Trust. Each of these domains was mapped to a number of structured indices.ConclusionsThere is a complex relationship among the legal, economic, and social domains of health care, which affects the state of HIT in low- and middle-income countries and associated data security risks. The strength of partnership and trust among collaborating organizations is an important moderating factor. Additional work is needed to formalize the assessment of partnership and trust and to develop a quantitative model of the conceptual framework that can help support organizational decision-making.

Dataset Information

Assessing the health risks of natural CO2 seeps in Italy.

Publications

Assessing the health risks of natural CO2 seeps in Italy.

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