GIS-based measures of environmental equity: exploring their sensitivity and significance

In order to determine whether principles of environmental justice have been violated, a large number of empirical studies have been carried out to ascertain whether minority and low-income populations are disproportionately exposed to industrial pollution. This study provides a comparative evaluation of two commonly employed proximity measures in GIS-based environmental equity assessment, examining their influence on the results of the analysis, and proposes a methodology for evaluating the significance of these results. 1990 census data on population characteristics and data from the 1995 EPA's toxic release inventory (TRI) for the City of Minneapolis, MN are used. These results also allow a preliminary assessment of environmental equity/inequity in potential exposure to airborne toxic chemicals for racial minorities, poor people and children in Minneapolis. In the third part of the paper we develop and employ a geographic randomization methodology for assessing the significance of these results.