Download or read book Footing the Bill for Superfund Cleanups written by Katherine N. Probst and published by Brookings Institution Press. This book was released on 2010-12-01 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the difficulties associated with Superfund—the federal government's program for cleaning up toxic waste sites in the United States—is the poor understanding we have about who is actually bearing its costs. While it is known that the tax on chemical and petroleum feedstocks raises about $570 million annually for the Superfund Trust Fund and the corporate environmental tax raises another $460 millino each year, further reliable data are only now becoming available. Researchers are beginning to understand how much potentially responsible parties and their insurers are spending on both transaction costs and on-site cleanups. Unfortunately, this is only the first part of the puzzle. Ultimately, these costs are borne by individuals--as consumers of the products or services provided or as share- or bond-holders, employees, or managers of the company. To date, no one has attempted to estimate the distribution of initial costs under the Superfund liability system or examined carefully the indirect effects of the costs of the Superfund program on other industries. In this book, the authors develop information on who pays the costs and who bears the burden under the current liability scheme in Superfund on a site-by-site basis. They look at short-term financial implications of changes in liability and taxes on key sectors affected by Superfund: chemicals, oil, mining, wood preserving, and commercial property-casualty insurers. They analyze the incidence of different taxing mechanisms and compare and contrast the financial effects on specific industries of the current Superfund program and of several alternative lability and tax-based funding mechanisms available. The alternative liability approaches examined include a scenario in which liability is eliminated for all sites created before Superfund was enacted, as well as a scenario in which parties are released from liability at sites where municipal and industrial wastes were codisposed. Because any change in liability will require a corollary change in trust fund revenues, the authors also assess the economic implications of a variety of taxes that could be used to finance the creation of a larger trust fund for site cleanups. These include an increase in the corporate environmental tax and the implemenation of new taxes, such as an excise tax on commercial insurance. Don Fullerton is a professor of economics and public policy at Carnegie Mellon, H. John Heinz III School of Public Policy and Management. Robert E. Litan, is a senior fellow at Brookings, and formerly was deputy assistant attorney general in the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. Paul R. Portney is vice president and senior fellow at resources for the Future. Katherine N. Probst is a fellow in the Center for Risk Management at Resources for the Future.
Download or read book Cutting Green Tape written by Roger Meiners and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-02-06 with total page 490 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hundreds of hazardous waste sites are on the Superfund National Priority List in the United States, and thousands more could become eligible. The Superfund has spent or ordered the spending of billions of dollars, with little apparent impact on human health risks. While public perception of the real or imagined hazardous nature of consumer and industrial substances has resulted in widespread attention to the issue, lawsuits have proliferated with liability aimed at "deep pockets" instead of individual agents who may be responsible. Contributors to Cutting Green Tape carefully examine the existence and severity of the toxic harms and liability problem, the erosion of a clear tort legal system to settle disputes, and whether a clearly defined system of property rights could be developed to reduce the dangers from toxic substances.Cutting Green Tape rethinks the nature and impact of today's environmental bureaucracy. Rather than continue unworkable, cumbersome, and often contradictory regulations, Cutting Green Tape prescribes a clearer tort legal system to settle disputes and demonstrates that clearly defined environmental property rights would reduce the threat of toxic substances. Among the many topics addressed are: air toxins policy; pollution, damages, and tort law; risk assessment, insurance, and public information; protecting groundwater; regulation of carcinogens; contracting for health and safety; and toxin torts by government.The book converges on a central theme: when common law remedies, with their burden of proof and standards of evidence, are replaced by the legislatively mandated regulatory regimes described, a problem emerges. The bureaucratic "tunnel vision" described by Justice Stephen Breyer, tends to take over. The police powers of the state are given to bureaucratic decision makers who are limited only by the blunt instrument of political influence, rather than by the need to show harm or wrongdoing in an unbiased court (as the police are), or by a budget on expenditures set by the Congress (as most bureaus are). The excesses described in the chapters thus result not from incompetence in the bureaus, but from the expansive powers granted to decision makers who are tightly focused on the narrow mission they see before them.
Download or read book Superfund Reassessment and Reauthorization written by United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Environment and Public Works. Subcommittee on Superfund, Waste Control, and Risk Assessment and published by . This book was released on 1996 with total page 910 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Superfund s Future written by Katherine Probst and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-09-30 with total page 330 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First Published in 2001. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
Download or read book Socially Responsible Investment Law written by Benjamin J Richardson and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2008-06-30 with total page 624 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Environmental harm is commonly associated with companies that extract, consume, and pollute our shared natural resources. Rarely are the 'unseen polluters,' the financiers that sponsor and profit from eco-damaging corporations, placed at the forefront of the environmental debate. By focusing on these unseen polluters, Benjamin Richardson provides a comprehensive examination of socially responsible investment (SRI), and offers a guide to possible reform. Richardson proposes that greater regulatory supervision of SRI will help ensure that the financial sector prioritizes ethically-based investments. In Socially Responsible Investment Law, he suggests that new governmental reforms should encourage companies to participate in socially responsible investments by providing a better mix of standards and incentives for SRI through measures that include redefining the fiduciary responsibilities of institutional investors to incorporate environmental concerns. By doing so, Richardson posits that corporate financiers, including banks, hedge funds, and pension plans, will become more accountable to the goals of ensuring sustainable development.
Download or read book Reform of Superfund Act of 1995 written by United States. Congress. House. Committee on Commerce. Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade, and Hazardous Materials and published by . This book was released on 1996 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Putting Trust in the US Budget written by Eric M. Patashnik and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2000 with total page 254 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the United States many important programs are paid from trust funds. At a time when major social insurance funds are facing insolvency, this book provided the first comprehensive study of this significant yet little-studied feature of the American welfare state. Equally importantly, the author investigates an enduring issue in democratic politics: can current officeholders bind their successors? By law, trust funds, which get most of their money from earmarked taxes, are restricted for specific uses. Patashnik asks why these structures were created, and how they have affected political dynamics. He argues that officeholders have used trust funds primarily to reduce political uncertainty, and bind distant futures. Based on detailed case studies of trust funds in a number of policy sectors, he shows how political commitment is a developmental process, whereby precommitments shape the content of future political conflicts. This book will be of interest to students of public policy, political economy and American political development.
Download or read book Environmental Regulation Through Financial Organisations Comparative Perspectives on the Industrialised Nations written by Benjamin Richardson and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2002-02-13 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book takes a comparative perspective of practice in the European Union, North America, Japan and Australasia, arguing that existing legal reforms to promote sustainable development are unlikely to be successful unless environmental policy can be diffused and embedded in the financial services sector. This sector plays a crucial role in creating the financial conditions that allow much economic development to proceed. Financial markets are already highly regulated in pursuance of various public policy objectives, and there is scope to adapt existing regulation to incorporate environmental aspects into the financial services sector. In terms of specific reforms, the book focuses on the role of corporate environmental reporting, economic instruments and liability rules to provide a proper context for engaging financial organisations with the environment, as well as reforms to the system of prudential regulation that currently governs this sector. Beyond the focus on the financial services sector, the book raises complex questions regarding the relationship between the state and market institutions in environmental policy, and will appeal to scholars from a wide range of disciplines interested in problems of environmental governance.
Download or read book Sediment Dredging at Superfund Megasites written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2007-11-30 with total page 317 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Some of the nation's estuaries, lakes and other water bodies contain contaminated sediments that can adversely affect fish and wildlife and may then find their way into people's diets. Dredging is one of the few options available for attempting to clean up contaminated sediments, but it can uncover and re-suspend buried contaminants, creating additional exposures for wildlife and people. At the request of Congress, EPA asked the National Research Council (NRC) to evaluate dredging as a cleanup technique. The book finds that, based on a review of available evidence, dredging's ability to decrease environmental and health risks is still an open question. Analysis of pre-dredging and post-dredging at about 20 sites found a wide range of outcomes in terms of surface sediment concentrations of contaminants: some sites showed increases, some no change, and some decreases in concentrations. Evaluating the potential long-term benefits of dredging will require that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency step up monitoring activities before, during and after individual cleanups to determine whether it is working there and what combinations of techniques are most effective.
Download or read book Political Environmentalism Going Behind the Green Curtain written by Terry Lee Anderson and published by Hoover Press. This book was released on 2000 with total page 356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Law and Economics of the Environment written by Anthony Heyes and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2001-01-01 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: . . . their collection together here represents a valuable addition to the library of those who are concerned with studying, teaching analysing, practicing, or making, environmental law as well as students and practitioners of environmental economics. David Hadley, The Economic Journal The exploration of the basic economics of externalities and the basic common law doctrines and institutions for dealing with externalities constitute a "first generation" of economic analysis of environmental law. The present book of essays illustrates the "second generation" of economic analysis of environmental law. The fundamental economic issues, and the common law, are no longer the focus. The lessons of the "first generation" have been absorbed and transcended. The focus has shifted to the level of application, which is the level at which the economist and the lawyer-economist can best hope to influence policy. We are making progress and the essays in this volume will do much to assure that progress continues. From the foreword by Richard A. Posner, United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and University of Chicago Law School, US One of the most exciting and productive areas of research in environmental policy is resulting from the integration of the traditionally separate fields of environmental economics and law and economics. This book brings together the top researchers engaged in this enterprise to share the useful insights that are emerging. Both in terms of the scope of coverage and the depth of analysis this is an absolutely first-rate book. Tom Tietenberg, Colby College, Maine, US This outstanding book focuses on how economics can contribute to the design, implementation and appraisal of legal systems that create the right incentives for environmental protection. The sixteen original and specially commissioned contributions written by some of the leading names in their field span many of the important areas of contemporary interest and employ case study material combined with theoretical, empirical and experimental research. The book addresses many topical issues including: the fundamental notions of property rights and social norms; the design and implementation of civil liability regimes; the use of criminal law as an instrument of environmental policy; the role that citizen suits, self-monitoring and self-enforcement could and should play in the implementation of law; the international harmonisation of environmental law; and the treatment of environmental damages in courts. Cutting-edge economic technique is motivated by, and articulates with, real and pressing policy debates. The contributors refer to a range of legal cases and policy decisions, and draw out a host of policy implications and prescriptions for settings as diverse as Superfund reform in the US and the harmonisation of landfill regulations in the European Union. By combining incisive overviews of the latest thinking and results, complemented by original analysis, The Law and Economics of the Environment will appeal to researchers and students of the environment, law and economics, policy practitioners and those with an interest in knowing what constitutes good environmental law.
Download or read book Site Remediation written by J. Andy Soesilo and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 1997-01-14 with total page 426 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Site Remediation: Planning and Management describes the management of remediation from a planning perspective, skillfully combining Superfund requirements and site remediation strategy in one practical volume. It clarifies and suggests remedies for the current quagmire of confusing Superfund reform and slow, expensive site remediation by thoroughly explaining the Superfund program and then describing how each of its components can fit into an integrated planning and management strategy. Site Remediation covers environmental sampling, site characterization, risk assessment, cleanup criteria, technology and technology screening, and public participation. Detailed and comprehensive, yet easy to understand, this book contains all you need to know about this important subject.
Download or read book Reclaiming the Land written by Gregg Macey and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2007-06-22 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nearly thirty years after creation of the most advanced and expensive hazardous waste cleanup infrastructure in the world, this book provides a much-needed lens through which the Superfund program should be assessed and reshaped. Focusing on the lessons of adaptive management, it explores new concepts and tools for the cleanup and reuse of contaminated sites, and for dealing with the uncertainty inherent in long-term site stewardship.
Download or read book Comparing Environmental Risks written by J. Clarence Davies and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-04-04 with total page 177 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The budgetary squeeze of the 1990s has made it obvious that the government cannot address every possible environmental problem. Comparative risk assessment (CRA) is increasingly advanced as the means for setting realistic priorities. RFF's Center for Risk Management commissioned background papers from leading experts on CRA for a meeting with federal regulatory officials. Comparing Environmental Risks presents the revised papers of this workshop. Representing the state of the art on programmatic CRA, its methodological analyses and practical recommendations will be invaluable to government officials, independent analysts, and anyone studying environmental policy.
Download or read book Economics and Liability for Environmental Problems written by Kathleen Segerson and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-01-12 with total page 524 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This title was first published in 2002. This convenient reference brings together notable contributions examining all aspects of the liability for environmental accidents. Articles included in the Part I of this volume examine the role of liability as a policy instrument, and provide detailed examinations of the incentive effects created by the imposition of liability, ie. Bankruptcy, litigation costs, delegation of responsibility and insurance. Those in Part II study specific environmental issues such as hazardous waste disposal and oil spills. The International Library of Environmental Economics and Policy explores the influence of economics on the development of environmental and natural resource policy. In a series of twenty five volumes, the most significant journal essays in key areas of the contemporary environmental and resource policy are collected. This convenient reference brings together the notable contributions examining all aspects of the liability for environmental accidents.
Download or read book Public Policies for Environmental Protection written by Paul Portney and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-10-28 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first edition of Public Policies for Environmental Protection contributed significantly to the incorporation of economic analysis in the study of environmental policy. Fully revised to account for changes in the institutional, legal, and regulatory framework of environmental policy, the second edition features updated chapters on the EPA and federal regulation, air and water pollution policy, and hazardous and toxic substances. It includes entirely new chapters on market-based environmental policies, global climate change, solid waste, and, for the first time, coverage of the Safe Drinking Water Act. Portney, Stavins, and their contributors provide an invaluable resource for researchers, policymakers, industry professionals, and journalists---anyone who needs up-to-date information on U.S. environmental policy. With their careful explanation of policy alternatives, the authors provide an ideal book for students in courses about environmental economics or environmental politics.
Download or read book Flashpoints in Environmental Policymaking written by Sheldon Kamieniecki and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 1997-04-25 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As a contribution to public policy and to help educate students about natural resource issues, this book identifies the likely "hot spots" of environmental policy and presents alternative and often opposing points of view on the major controversies that are likely to be with us well into the next century. Among the topics covered are comparative risk assessment; market incentives in environmental regulation; environmental justice; public versus private management of public lands; international trade and sustainable development; and the relationship between national security and environmental protection.
