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Policies
and Programs on Pollution Prevention in the United States
Hongyan He
Civil
and Environment Engineering, Stanford University, CA, USA 94305
Abstract:
This
paper summarizes the policies and programs on pollution prevention (P2)
in the United States. It starts with the definition of pollution
prevention, then briefly describes the history of P2 policy in the
United States. The Pollution Prevention Act of 1990, the P2 policy
framework, and major P2 programs in the United States are reported. The
Act prescribes the responsibility of the US EPA and relevant
enterprises. The US EPA is required to set up a P2 office, P2 grants,
and a P2 clearinghouse. It is also responsible to report its actions of
promoting P2 and the results of those actions to the US Congress
biennially. The enterprises involved with certain toxic chemicals are
obligated to report their use and disposal of these chemicals. Based on
the Act, the US EPA established a P2 policy framework, which includes
five components: society, business, government, technologies, and
products. Correspondingly, the UE EPA has set up a number of programs to
address the five components in the framework and to fulfill the
requirements stipulated in the Pollution Prevention Act of 1990.
Key
words: Pollution
prevention, policies, programs, the United States
P2
and Cleaner Production
Pollution
prevention
means source reduction and other practices that reduce or eliminate the
creation of pollutants through increased efficiency in the use of raw
materials, energy, water, or other resources, or protection of natural
resources by conservation.
Source reduction, according to the Pollution Prevention Act of
1990, means any practice which
1)
reduces the amount of hazardous substance, pollutant, or
contaminant entering any waste stream or otherwise released into the
environment prior to recycling, treatment, or disposal; and
2)
reduces the hazards to public health and the environment
associated with the release of such substances, pollutants, or
contaminants. The term includes equipment or technology modifications,
process or procedure modifications, reformulation or redesign of
products, substitution of raw materials, and improvements in
housekeeping, maintenance, training, or inventory control.
However,
source reduction does not include any practice which alters the
physical, chemical, or biological characteristics or the volume of a
hazardous substance, pollutant, or contaminant through a process or
activity which itself is not integral to and necessary for the
production of a product or the providing of a service.
Cleaner
production (CP),
according to United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), is “the
continuous application of an integrated, preventive environmental
strategy applied to processes, products, and services to increase
eco-efficiency and reduce risks to humans and the environment.”
For
production processes, cleaner production includes conserving raw
materials and energy, eliminating toxic raw materials, and reducing the
quantity and toxicity of all emissions and wastes before they leave a
process. For products, cleaner production focuses on reducing impacts
along the entire life cycle of the product, from raw materials
extraction to the ultimate disposal of the products. For services,
cleaner production reduces the environmental impacts of the provided
service over its entire life cycle, from system design and use to the
entire consumption of resources required to provide the services.
Although
some countries (such as the United States) use the phrase of
“pollution prevention” while other countires (for example, China and
most European countries) use the phrase of
“cleaner production”, there is not much difference between
the meanings of these two phrases. The underlying ideas of the two
phrases are silimar: to incoporate pollution control into production
with measures such as source control, process adjustment, and management
improvement. There are many countries that have been implementing P2 or
CP policies and programs for decades, such as the United States. These
countries’ experiences with implementing P2 and CP are highly relevant
to China.
History
of P2 in USA
Twenty years ago, the only measurable aspect of pollution
prevention at the US Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) was its
waste minimization[2]
activity. In the early 1980s, prevention was largely limited to a few
specific facility projects, where some companies were able to identify
and pick prevention’s “low-hanging fruit.”
By
the late 1980s, the prevention concept had attracted and galvanized US
EPA’s policy makers. P2 gained momentum with the passage of national
legislation in 1990 and the implementation of a series of US EPA
prevention-specific programs.
By the mid 1990s, the EPA had shifted into a third phase -
greater institutionalization of prevention approaches into its
mainstream activities, including regulations, permitting, technical
assistance, compliance and enforcement.
Pollution
Prevention Act of 1990
In 1990, through the Pollution Prevention Act, the US Congress
formally established a national policy to prevent or reduce pollution at
its sources whenever feasible.
The Act set up a hierarchy of pollution reduction measures in the
United States:
1)
P2 is the national policy that pollution should be prevented or
reduced at source whenever feasible;
2)
Pollution that cannot be prevented should be recycled in an
environmentally safe manner, whenever feasible;
3)
Pollution that cannot be prevented or recycled should be treated
in an environmentally safe manner whenever feasible; and
4)
The disposal or other release into the environment should be
employed only as a last resort and should be conducted in an
environmentally safe manner.
The
Act prescribes activities the US EPA should conduct and functions it
should fulfill, with regard to promoting pollution prevention within the
United States. Major provisions of the Act include the followings:
1)
Establishing a P2 strategy and outlining the Agency’s intent to
promote source reduction and collect data on source reduction and
recycling;
2)
Providing matching funds for state and local P2 programs through
the Pollution Prevention Incentives for States (PPIS) grant program;
3)
Operating a source reduction clearinghouse (information center);
4)
Reporting requirements for both enterprises and the US EPA. Enterprises required to file an annual toxic-chemical-release
form shall include toxic chemical source reduction and recycling report
for a preceding year. US EPA is required to provide US Congress with a
report biennially, containing a detailed desription of the actions taken
to implement the strategy to promote source reduction and the results of
such actions.
To
meet the requirements of the Pollution Prevention Act of 1990, US EPA
has established a P2 policy framework to guide its efforts, and it has
also developed a series of P2 programs.
P2
Policy Framework
US EPA’s framework for pollution prevention has five
components:’
1)
A Guiding Social Principle
US
EPA’s overall objective is to promote source reduction as the core
environmental ethic of society. Therefore, it has focused on educating
industry and the general public to the virtues of prevention by the
following actions:
·
Foster
prevention awareness across society;
·
Engage
the environmental, environmental justice, labor, consumer, and other
social sectors as partners in prevention;
·
Promote
P2 oriented community college and university instruction;
·
Form
partner with the public health community to demonstrate that
“pollution prevention is disease prevention”; and
·
Champion
prevention as the environmental principle of first choice in the
international community.
2)
Sustainable Business Practices
The
US EPA believes that industry, through eco-efficiency, sustainable
development and other movements, should play a leadership role in
pollution prevention. One of its objectives is to promote pollution
prevention approaches and techniques as an essential part of how
businesses operate. More specifically, the EPA aims to:
·
Increase
partnerships with industry to advance eco-efficiency and other
approaches that shift business “beyond compliance” and increase
corporate environmental stewardship and private sector P2
infrastructure;
·
Assist
businesses to understand the full spectrum of their environmental costs,
and to integrate environmental factors into their corporate cost and
materials accounting and decision-making processes;
·
Identify
approaches and incentives to engage the larger financial sector, such as
investment community, bankers, insurance underwriters, and mutual fund
managers, to support prevention;
·
Support
government small business assistance programs that provide environmental
information in a business context; and
·
Utilize
the rapid growth of corporate environmental management systems to
promote systems to promote prevention.
3)
Government Actions
In
this area, the US EPA intends to integrate P2 into its regulatory and
other mainstream programs. EPA has the following objectives:
·
Incorporate
multi-media approaches or alternatives into key EPA rules, permitting or
compliance assistance activities, and through regulatory enforcement
efforts;
·
Target
the top industrial polluters and the worst pollutants;
·
Promote
integration of P2 approaches in state regulatory programs through
national grants;
·
Improve
the quality and quantity of P2 information and assistance to state and
tribal P2 programs; and
·
Promote
P2 in new EPA’s programs.
4)
Cleaner Technologies and Processes
Realized
the difficulty for industry to abandon standard chemical use and
production processes without preferable and reliable options, the US
EPA, although with other federal government agencies, set their
objective of helping companies continuously identify and apply cleaner
technologies and practices. Particularly, EPA aims to
·
Help
industry make more informed environmental decisions about the use of
alternative chemicals, processes and technologies to prevent pollution;
·
Foster
chemical methods that reduce or eliminate the use or generation of toxic
substance during the design, manufacture and use of chemical products
and process;
·
Identify
and reduce risks to human health and the environment from existing and
future exposure to priority persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic
chemicals (PBTs) in particular;
·
Develop
new P2 tools which increase the understanding and use of important P2
concepts, such as life-cycle assessment;
·
Bring
the influence of compliance and regulatory enforcement to bear on new
prevention technology development and application; and
·
Increase
collaboration with other federal agencies, such as the Department of
Energy, Commerce, and Defense, in the development and dissemination of
P2 technology.
5)
Safe Products
The
US EPA intends to make consumers informed what chemicals are in the
products and services they purchased, and the hazards associated with
those chemicals. Therefore, the EPA set the following objectives to
ensure safe products and services:
·
Make
information about hazardous chemicals more widely available to the
public;
·
Foster
P2, empower consumer choice, and improve consumer understanding of safe
use, environmental, and health information on household consumer product
labels;
·
Provide
Federal leadership through environmentally preferable procurement and
other administration process, with the EPA “leading by example;” and
·
Establish
a foundation of Federal policy in defining environmentally preferable
products for our society, with a particular emphasis on protecting
children ’s health.
P2
Programs
The
US EPA’s P2 programs are designed to facilitate the incorporation of
pollution prevention concepts and principles into the daily operation of
government agencies, businesses, manufacturers, nonprofit organizations,
and individuals. The EPA’s P2 programs can be divided into four
categories:
1)
Persistent, Bioaccumulative and Toxic (PBT) Chemical Initiatives
The
PBT Chemical Initiative is to reduce risks from and exposures to
priority PBT chemicals through increased coordination among the EPA
national and regional programs. The EPA is committing, through this
program, to create an enduring cross-office system that will address the
cross-media issues associated with priority PBT pollutants.
Four elements are included in the PBT strategy:
i)
Develop and implement national action plans to reduce priority
PBT pollutants, utilizing the full range of EPA tools;
ii)
Continue to screen and select more priority PBT pollutants for
actions;
iii)
Prevent new PBTs from entering the marketplace; and
iv)
Measure progress of these actions against the goals and national
commitment in the US Government Performance and Results Act[3].
To
make this strategy work, the US EPA outlines a number of actions. Some
of the near-term actions include:
i)
Preventing the introduction of new PBTs into commerce that may
pose an unreasonable risk to human health, and to require testing to
confirm a chemical’s PBT status;
ii)
Encouraging voluntary reduction of priority PBTs in hazardous
waste;
iii)
Giving the public information on mercury emissions from
utilities; and
iv)
Evaluating fish in U.S. water bodies for PBT contamination.
2)
Green Products
The
US EPA has encouraged consumers to incorporate environmental factors
into their normal purchasing process and advocated labeling products
according to their environmental impacts.
There
are three programs conducted by the EPA: Consumer Labeling,
Environmental Preferable Purchasing (EPP), and Product Stewardship. The
Consumer Labeling Initiative examines ways to provide better
environmental information on products to consumers. The EPP is to
encourage, motive, and assist Federal agencies to include environmental
concerns, along with price and performance, as a factor in their
purchasing decisions. Under Product Stewardship, all participants in the
product life cycle - designers, suppliers, manufacturers, distributors,
retailers, users, recyclers, and disposers - share responsibility for
the environmental effects of the products.
3)
Business Practices
EPA
has created five programs to encourage businesses to incorporate
environmental concerns into their standard financial and accounting
practices. These programs
include:
i)
Small Business Programs and Initiatives. These programs aim to
streamline and coordinate technical assistance from small business
development and to provide small business a voice in the EPA’s rule
making process.
ii)
P2 Business Development and Finance. This program is to promote
environmental stewardship by assessing a potential role for the
financial community.
iii)
Voluntary Standards Network .
It is comprised of over 130 representatives from each agency program
office and region. It is the principal vehicle for coordinating the
EPA’s input to the US Technical Advisory Group on ISO 14000 and
communicating the EPA’s policies on environmental management system.
iv)
Environmental Accounting Project. This program aims to promote
sound management accounting and capital budgeting practices which better
address environmental costs.
v)
Design for Environment (DfE) and Green Chemistry. Design for
Environment aims to encourage the design of safer products and processes
in particular industries, such as dry cleaning, screen printing and
electrons. Green Chemistry is the design, manufacture, and use of
environmentally benign chemical products and processes that prevent
pollution and reduce environmental and human health risks.
4)
P2 Grants
The
US EPA sponsors three grant programs that specifically promote P2
activities. The Pollution Prevention Incentives for States (PPIS) grant
program is to help develop and sustain state P2 program activities and
pioneer new P2 approaches in the states. The Environmental Justice
through Pollution Prevention (EJP2) grant program is to help
community-based groups across the nation develop collaborative
approaches to achieve environmentally justice through pollution
prevention. The Pollution Prevention Information Network grant
competition is to promote sharing of P2 information, training and
technical assistance expertise among states.
Conclusion
The
United States had developed a packges of policies and programs to
implement pollution prevention. The core is the Pollution Prevention Act
of 1990, which provides the legal foundation for the US EPA to establish
the P2 policy framework and carry out its P2 programs. The Act
stipulates many responsibilities of the US EPA in promoting pollution
prevention, but set little obligation for manufacturers and consumers.
Therefore, most P2 programs do not impose legally-binding requirements
for businesses. Some P2 programs aim to provide information of pollution
prevention to enterprises and consumers, for example, the Consumer
Labeling Initiative; some intend to provide financial assistances to
community-based and state P2 programs, such as Pollution Prevention
Incentives for States Grant; while others aim to engage enterprises in
voluntary actions, such as Design for Environment and Environmental
Accounting projects.
However,
up to now, many programs are in fledging stages, and their influences
are still difficult to be identified. What is more, most of these
programs are complicated programs consisted of many components, and
relevant to different types of stakeholders. Only a few studies
assessing the effectiveness of these programs have been done, and no
final conclusion has been drawn yet. In addition, the P2 policies and
programs in the United States are designed and carried out in its
particular social, economic, political, and legal contexts, which are be
quite different from the China’s situation. Policy makers should
consider these differences if they intend to apply the approaches of
promoting pollution prevention in US to China.
References
1.
Browner,
Carol. New Directions for Environmental Protection.” Pollution
prevention policy statement, issued on July 14, 1993.
2.
United Nations Environmental Programme, Industry and Environment
Office. Cleaner Production: A
Guide to Sources of Information. 2nd ed. Paris:
UNEP, 1998.
3.
---, and United Nations Industrial Development Organization.
Audit and Reduction Manual for Industrial Emission and Waste.
Technical Report Series #7. UN, 1991.
4.
US Congress, United States code Title 42, The Public Health and
Welfare Chapter 133. Pollution
Prevention Act of 1990, website: http://www.epa.gov/opptintr/p2home/p2policy/act1990.htm.
5.
US EPA, Pollution
Prevention, website: http://www.epa.gov.
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