Community health risk assessment of primary aluminum smelter emissions.

Abstract

Primary aluminum production is an industrial process with high potential health risk for workers. We consider in this article how to assess community health risks associated with primary aluminum smelter emissions. We reviewed the literature on health effects, community exposure data, and dose-response relationships of the principal hazardous agents emitted. On the basis of representative measured community exposure levels, we were able to make rough estimates on health risks associated with specific agents and categorize these as none, low, medium, or high. It is possible to undertake a rough-estimate community Health Risk Assessment for individual smelters on the basis of information available in the epidemiological literature and local community exposure data.