THE AIR IS ALWAYS CLEANER ON THE OTHER SIDE: RACE, SPACE, AND AMBIENT AIR TOXICS EXPOSURES IN CALIFORNIA MANUEL PASTOR, JR. University of California, Santa Cruz RACHEL MORELLO-FROSCH Brown University JAMES L. SADD Occidental College ABSTRACT: Environmental justice advocates have recently focused attention on cumulative exposure in minority neighborhoods due to multiple sources of pollution. This article uses U.S. EPA’s National Air Toxics Assessment (NATA) for 1996 to examine environmental inequality in California, a state that has been a recent innovator in environmental justice policy. We first estimate potential lifetime cancer risks from mobile and stationary sources. We then consider the distribution of these risks using both simple comparisons and a multivariate model in which we control for income, land use, and other explanatory factors, as well as spatial correlation. We find large racial disparities in California’s ‘‘riskscape’’ as well as inequalities by other factors and suggest several implications for environmental and land use policy. In 2000, Sunlaw Energy, a company seeking to build a new natural gas-powered power plant, approached the city of South Gate, an industrial suburb along the Alameda Corridor in Los Angeles County. While such plants often trigger resistance, partly because of fears of air pollution, the company promised to make use of a new cleaner pollution-control system that had only been deployed thus far in mini-generators. As this was to be the first test of whether the technology could be brought up to scale in a larger plant, many environmentalists from around the region and the state were supportive, particularly given that the statewide energy crisis in California was creating pressure for a rapid build-out of the power grid. Labor unions were also interested in the jobs that could be generated along with the electricity. Some local community members and city leaders were not so enthusiastic. Invoking the notion of cumulative exposure, they argued that a new plant, no matter how clean, was an *Direct Correspondence to: Manuel Pastor, Latin American and Latino Studies, University of California, Santa Cruz, Merrill College, Santa Cruz, CA 95064. E-mail: mpastor@ucsc.edu JOURNAL OF URBAN AFFAIRS, Volume 27, Number 2, pages 127–148. Copyright # 2005 Urban Affairs Association All rights of reproduction in any form reserved. ISSN: 0735-2166.