Government as Both Polluter and Environmental Regulator

NEW RFF RESEARCH PROJECT LOOKS AT GOVERNMENT AS BOTH POLLUTER AND ENVIRONMENTAL REGULATOR

FOR RELEASE: Wednesday, January 13, 1999
Contact: Michael Tebo (202) 328-5019 [email protected]

WASHINGTON, DC -- In a research project at Resources for the Future (RFF) (http://www.rff.org), researchers in RFF's Center for Risk Management (CRM) are examining the extent of pollution generated by government at the federal, state, and local level. They are also looking at what happens when a government environmental agency regulates the activities of another government agency.

The project, undertaken by CRM Director J. Clarence (Terry) Davies and RFF Senior Fellow Kate Probst, has three major components: an assessment of the overall dimensions of the problem of government pollution and the importance of government agencies and facilities as regulated entities; an examination of cases where governments are regulated differently than their corporate brethren; and a description of the political dynamics of government regulating governments.

"The amount of pollution contributed by governmental entities is so large that a case can be made that 'governmental pollution' is the largest pollution problem in the United States," Probst says. "The hazardous waste problems at former weapons production sites [now the responsibility of U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)], for example, exceed in, risk, magnitude and cost any other hazardous waste problem."

"Most of the attention in the environmental field is focused on the impact of regulations on private companies," Probst adds. "Yet, many activities of federal, state, and local governments are regulated under the nation's environmental laws. The issue of how well governmental agencies are complying with environmental rules, whether they are significant polluters, and the implications of major changes in the environmental statutes on governmental organizations are all issues that get less attention on Capitol Hill or in the press."

There are three primary reasons, according to Davies, why pollution by government is an important problem. They range, he says, from the very concrete to the somewhat abstract: the amount of pollution contributed by governmental entities; the need for environmental government agencies to influence the policies of non-environmental government agencies; and the potential incompatibility of, for example, government producing electric power while at the same trying to regulate electricity generation.

The need for environmental agencies to influence the policies of non-environmental agencies arises in part from the need to control and eliminate the nation's pollution problems. But there is a larger reason as well, Davies says.

"The future of environmental quality in the United States is likely to be determined as much by the policies of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, DOE, state public utility regulators, and the U.S. Department of Transportation as by any regulations issued by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency," Davies says.

"Given both the diffuse nature of many current pollution problems and the unpopularity of command-and-control regulation, future progress in environmental improvement will depend heavily on influencing sectoral policies in energy, agriculture, and transportation," Davies says. "How the goals embodied in environmental legislation can be incorporated into the goals or programs of other agencies is a question to which no good solution is available at the present time."

"Understanding how governments try to regulate each other should provide some insight into how to devise policies to address this need," he says.

"Finally," Probst adds, "there is a philosophical but practical problem which cannot be ignored. To the extent that regulation does not work well to influence the policies and activities of governmental entities, there will be an incompatibility between regulatory goals and having activities performed by government agencies. This will come as no surprise to those familiar with the negative effect of state enterprises on the environment in Russia and other socialist nations.

"Our study should shed some light on whether this incompatibility is intractable or whether there are mechanisms to modify the conflict," she says.

Davies and Probst expect to conclude their preliminary research by the end of 1999. They then expect to issue a report of their findings by early 2000.

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J. CLARENCE (TERRY) DAVIES is director of Resources for the Future's (RFF) Center for Risk Management. He is a former assistant administrator for policy at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and, while serving as a consultant to the President's Advisory Council on Executive Organization in 1969, co-authored the reorganization plan that created U.S. EPA.

KATE PROBST is a senior fellow in RFF's Center for Risk Management. Over the past 18 years, she has conducted a wide range of analyses of federal environmental programs, focusing primarily on the implementation of hazardous waste programs under Superfund and the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act.