Downstream effects of upstream causes

DOI10.1080/01621459.2019.1574226MaRDI QIDQ5208051zbMATH OpenOpenAlexFDO

Authors Bradley C. Saul, Michael G. Hudgens, Michael A. Mallin

Publication date 15 January 2020

Published in Journal of the American Statistical Association (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/1705.07926

zbMATH Keywords

\(g\)-formulamarginal structural modelspotential outcomesstructural nested models

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Applications of statistics to environmental and related topics (62P12)

Abstract: The United States Environmental Protection Agency considers nutrient pollution in stream ecosystems one of the U.S. most pressing environmental challenges. But limited independent replicates, lack of experimental randomization, and space- and time-varying confounding handicap causal inference on effects of nutrient pollution. In this paper the causal g-methods developed by Robins and colleagues are extended to allow for exposures to vary in time and space in order to assess the effects of nutrient pollution on chlorophyll a, a proxy for algal production. Publicly available data from the North Carolina Cape Fear River and a simulation study are used to show how causal effects of upstream nutrient concentrations on downstream chlorophyll a levels may be estimated from typical water quality monitoring data. Estimates obtained from the parametric g-formula, a marginal structural model, and a structural nested model indicate that chlorophyll a concentrations at Lock and Dam 1 were influenced by nitrate concentrations measured 86 to 109 km upstream, an area where four major industrial and municipal point sources discharge wastewater.

Recommendations

• Estimating and modeling spatio-temporal correlation structures for river monitoring networks
• Spatial inference of nitrate concentrations in groundwater
• Estimating causal effects of air quality regulations using principal stratification for spatially correlated multivariate intermediate outcomes
• Consequences of the Clean Water Act and the demand for water quality
• River pollution components mean annual values estimation by computer modeling

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• Correcting for non-compliance in randomized trials using structural nested mean models
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Describes a project that uses

Uses Software

• geepack
• simcausal
• Hmisc
• gee

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