Air Pollution is Destroying Quality of Life in Many California Cities

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Whether in search of a larger home, or a more affordable one, housing is the most common reason people move in the United States – and California’s high-price real estate market is pushing people out. The typical home in California is worth $715,900, more than double the national median home value, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. It may be no coincidence that nearly 818,000 Americans left California in 2022, by far the most of any state.

But according to a recent report from the online real estate broker Redfin, health and safety risks associated with climate change may also be driving the exodus. The report found that of the 100 most populous metro areas in the United States, there are 13 where at least 85% of homes are at high risk of poor air quality, and nine of them are in California.

These 13 metro areas reported a combined net-outflow of about 245,000 people between 2019 and 2020, and of more than 662,000 between 2021 and 2022.

Poor air quality in these places is largely attributable to wildfires, and California is ground-zero for wildfires in the United States. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, California has been impacted by eight of the nine costliest wildfire disasters in the U.S. over the last decade.

Wildfires release large quantities of fine particulate matter, a mixture of pollutants with a diameter of 2.5 microns or less, into the atmosphere. In high concentrations, fine particulate matter, or PM2.5, has been linked to asthma attacks, acute and chronic bronchitis, problems with the heart and lungs, and premature mortality. Children and older adults are especially vulnerable to PM2.5 exposure.

According to data from the Environmental Protection Agency, the number of poor air quality days in the Western U.S. surged by 477% between 2000 and 2021, and the increase was driven largely by wildfires.

As temperatures rise globally, the risks posed by wildfires will likely only worsen. Even if greenhouse gas emissions are reduced modestly, the average annual loss attributable to wildfires in California is expected to climb by 13% as early as 2030 and 31% by 2050, according to the 2023 Wildfire Risk Report from real estate data company CoreLogic.

As Americans are leaving California and other parts of the Western U.S. at high-risk of poor air quality, cities with cleaner air are growing rapidly. According to Redfin, 59 of the 100 largest U.S. metro areas have virtually no risk of poor air quality. Collectively, these cities reported a net-influx of 595,000 people in 2020 and 675,000 people in 2022.