The Air Quality Life Index (AQLI) converts air pollution concentrations into their impact on life expectancy. Through the AQLI’s hyper-local data, users anywhere on Earth can zoom into their district and see how much longer they would live if policies were to reduce pollution to meet the World Health Organization’s guideline, a national standard, or a user-defined target. This information can help inform local communities and policymakers about the benefits of air pollution policies in perhaps the most important measure that exists: longer lives.
Developed by the University of Chicago’s Milton Friedman Distinguished Service Professor in Economics Michael Greenstone and his team at the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago ( EPIC ), the AQLI is rooted in peer-reviewed research that quantifies the causal relationship between long-term human exposure to air pollution and life expectancy. It is a part of EPIC's Clean Air Program , which works to bring actionable information about air pollution to every corner of the globe in order to motivate action and lay guideposts for efficient air pollution policies. In addition to the AQLI, this work includes the EPIC Air Quality Fund , which worked with local organizations and governments to bring high quality and high frequency air pollution monitoring and data access to the places of the world where it is needed most.
Driven by EPIC's overarching mission to use cutting-edge evidence to help societies balance the needs for environmental quality and economic growth so that people can live fuller lives, the Clean Air Program also works with policymakers to develop more effective and efficient policies, including through market mechanisms. For example, EPIC helped policymakers in Gujarat, India launch the world’s first cap-and-trade market for particulate air pollution. That effort is now scaling to other regions in the Global South.
EPIC is an initiative of the University of Chicago's Institute for Climate and Sustainable Growth , which leverages the University’s unique legacy and resources to balance the risks of a changing climate with the essential need for human progress. It does so by combining frontier research in economics and policy, climate systems engineering, and energy technologies with a pioneering approach to energy and climate education. The Institute also seeds interdisciplinary research that explores new topics in this ever-evolving field and deploys practical, effective solutions in countries central to this challenge.