The University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) has announced a grant of nearly $21 million to conduct the Aliso Canyon Disaster Health Research Study.

The public-private effort funded by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health will evaluate the short- and long-term health impacts of the gas blowout, which occurred in late October 2015 and lasted into 2016. The Aliso Canyon disaster was the largest underground gas storage facility disaster in U.S. history, releasing an estimated 109,000 metric tons of methane into the atmosphere, along with other oil and gas products, over a period of nearly four months. A multidisciplinary team of UCLA scientists and healthcare practitioners will conduct the study, which will consist of five components, including a health and healthcare use assessment, exposure assessment, community engagement, data management and statistical analysis, and overall program administration.

“People living close to the Aliso Canyon natural gas storage facility have legitimate questions about how emissions from the facility might affect their health now and in the future,” said Michael Jerrett, UCLA Fielding School of Public Health professor of environmental health sciences and co-principal investigator of the study. “We have brought together a team of the world’s best scientists to investigate the environmental and health impact of the facility, including physical and mental health, quality of life, and overall well-being throughout their life course. We will focus on studying health impacts from the blowout disaster in 2015-2016 and from the routine emissions from the facility. The outcomes of these studies will be exceptionally important and also at times, very complex. We will present these findings in a clear and approachable way to provide the information needed by residents, regulators, and policy makers to understand the disaster impacts and take actions when needed.” 

(Photo credit: Getty Images/LagunaticPhoto)