Using the Tools of Pollution Prevention to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions

• Date: 01 September 2009

9-2009 NEWS & ANALYSIS 39 ELR 10851

Using the Tools of Pollution

Prevention to Reduce

Greenhouse Gas Emissions

by Richard Reibstein

Richard Reibstein is a Lecturer in Environmental Law and Policy at Boston University and an

Environmental Analyst at the Massachusetts Oce of Technical Assistance. Mr. Reibstein’s opinions

are his own and should not be attributed to the institutions with which he is aliated.

Our public debate about policy to combat climate

change sometimes seems limited to a choice between

trading and taxes. Yet, there are other tools of gov-

ernance that could be more actively examined. e problem

of global warming is so big that we should be actively pursu-

ing a “full-toolbox” approach of doing everything we can,

and considering how each strategy can be synergistically

implemented in concert with other strategies. is Article

argues for greater attention to a suite of tools successfully

used to promote pollution prevention: assistance, planning,

and expanded right to know reporting. ese tools employ a

mode of governance that may be termed “relational,” where

government complements traditional enforcement with

eorts to encourage self-responsibility and enlist collabora-

tion with willing members of the regulated community. at

community is not a homogeneous group, but is composed of

many dierent entities presenting a great variety of motiva-

tions and capacities. A full-toolbox, relational approach ca n

more powerfully control risks a nd harness the potential for

creative solutions, fostering not just environmental progress

but also building the social and intellectual capital necessary

for the technological and economic adva ncement that will

most eectively solve our problems. e pollution prevention

(P2) movement provides examples of how we might best use

government to mobilize resources to address global warming.

I. P2’s Quiet Success

P2 has been the declared policy of the United States since the

passage of the Pollution Prevention Act of 1990,

1

and in the

1. See Pollution Prevention Act of 1990, Pub. L. No. 101-508, §§6601-6610,

104 Stat. 1388, 1388-1321 to 1388-1327 (codied at 42 U.S.C. §§13101-

13109). e preamble of the Act states, in part:

Congress nds that: (1) e United States of America annually pro-

duces millions of tons of pollution and spends tens of billions of dol-

lars per year controlling this pollution. (2) ere are signicant op-

portunities for industr y to reduce or prevent pollution at the source

through cost-eective changes in production, operation, and raw

materials use. Such changes oer industry substantial savings in re-

duced raw material, pollution control, and liability costs as well as

early 1990s every state had a P2 program that typically pro-

vided education and assistance to companies in nding ways to

reduce pollution at the source, instead of controlling pollution

after it had been created. Despite what some might term “a

general ennui” about P2, the data indicate substantial accom-

plishments have resulted from what ha s been relatively minimal

investment. ese programs have had quiet success by helping

companies redesign processes, reformulate products, perform

more careful measurement and use, and other eciency and

substitution eorts to reduce and prevent pollution. e U.S.

National Pollution Prevention Roundtable, the organization of

P2 professionals, issued a report in 2009 nding the following:

[S]tate and local programs documented overall reductions

of approximately 7.7 billion pounds of pollution: 5 billion

pounds from reducing materials and waste; 2 billion pounds

from reducing air em issions; and 60 million p ounds from

reducing water pollution from 2004 to 20 06. In add ition,

water consumption was reduced by over 4 billion gallons

and energy usag e was reduced by over 1 billion k ilowatt-

hours... . In almost every case, these eort s have not only

led to environmental improvement, but have been cost-

eective, saving a total of approximately $6.4 bill ion.2

help protect the environment and reduce risks to worker health and

safety. (3) e opportunities for source reduction are often not realized

because existing regulations, and the industrial resources they require

for compliance, focus upon treatment and disposal, rather than source

reduction; existing regulations do not emphasize multi-media man-

agement of pollution; and businesses need information and technical

assistance to overcome institutional barriers to the adoption of source

reduction practices. (4) Source reduction is fundamentally dierent

and more desirable than waste management and pollution control.

e Environmental Protection Agency needs to address the historical

lack of attention to source reduction.

42 U.S.C. §13101(a) (2007). In the P2 Act, Congress declared that it is “the na-

tional policy of the United States that pollution should be prevented or reduced

at the source whenever feasible,” describing what has been termed the “hier-

archy” of management options—recycling when pollution cannot be avoided,

then treatment, and then disposal or release as a last resort. Id. §13101(b).

2. N’ P P R, R  S: P-

 P P F   , R F  N-

 P P D M S  (2009), available at

http://www.p2.org/wp-content/road-to-sustainability-2004-20062.pdf.

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