Linking health impact and Post-environmental impact assessments: a case of municipal sewage treatment plant volatile organic compounds

Deficiencies remain in current health impact assessment (HIA) and environmental impact assessment (EIA) projects. To address the shortcomings in EIA theory, a case of odors from a municipal sewage treatment plant (MSTP) was examined and geographic factors were employed to associate the spatial diffusion of the pollutants with the population’s activities based on land-use attributes. After screening the MSTP priority control pollutants, odors, hydrogen sulfide, and ammonia were selected for this study. Then, the spatial parameters for the pollutant simulation were surveyed, including parameters concerning the meteorological analysis, environmental emission monitoring, and emission source analysis, and a prediction of the pollutant diffusion as imaged and identified. The types of human social activity and exposure patterns were sorted as land-use attributes. An integration of the spatial diffusion of the pollutants with the exposure profiles of the scenario population according to the land-use attributes was achieved using counterpart spatial coordination factors. In our study, the commonly applied method of HIA risk calculation was followed and then extended by the spatial techniques introduced. The results of the scenario HIA contours are presented here, making it easy to determine the acceptable levels of the MSTP odor pollutants on a geographic scale. This study examines a significant approach to associate HIA with post-EIA via spatial factors and addresses the deficiencies of HIA in EIA empirical applications.