In a prior post, we mentioned that the Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) was seeking comments on EPA’s role in promoting sustainability. On November 30, 2010, the other shoe dropped and, in an unusual joint press conference, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson and Ralph Cicerone, President of the National Academies of Science (“NAS”), announced a comprehensive study to develop an overall framework that EPA can use to overhaul virtually every regulatory program to make EPA’s policies, decisions and regulatory actions more “sustainable.”
The report will attempt to answer such questions as:
• What should be the operational framework for sustainability for EPA?
• How can EPA’s decisionmaking process, rooted in the risk assessment/risk management (RA/RM) paradigm, be integrated into this new sustainability framework?
• What scientific and analytical tools are needed to support the framework?
• What expertise is needed to support the framework?
EPA and NAS will host a workshop in December 2010 to gather ideas. The group will begin drafting in January 2011, an unusually fast timeline for the NAS report process.
Administrator Jackson pointedly asserted that it is not clear the solutions of the past (such as setting maximum limits based on risk) are sufficient to make regulatory decisions sustainable. Sustainability, in EPA’s view, is primary prevention, not reaction; in the words of Administrator Jackson, it is the difference between treating disease and preventing injury. While many may argue this characterization unfairly describes the existing framework, it is clear from the announcement and press conference that EPA views these changes as significant. Paul Anastas (EPA’s Assistant Administrator for Research and Development) acknowledged that this new focus on sustainability will require a substantial amount of work to address the complexities of the challenges involved with solving environmental problems in one medium or area without transferring a problem to another medium.
The Chair of the new Committee, Dr. Bernie Goldstein, said that the Committee would rely upon the body of existing literature, particularly international sustainability developments. Among other things, the report will need to define what is meant by sustainability. Chairman Goldstein and Administrator Jackson analogized this effort to the 1983 so-called NAS red book on risk assessment that developed a framework for human health risk assessment and, as with the red book, the impact will be far reaching and potentially transformative. Dr. Cicerone indicated that the report will attempt to advise EPA on how it can demonstrate flexibility and meet emerging challenges.
Dr. Cicerone repeatedly asked all stakeholders to provide input and there are strong practical reasons for companies to do so. The new framework will have a substantial impact on the way EPA regulates chemicals, water, and air, and the degree to and methods in which science interacts with policy on these issues. No group of NAS committee members is likely to be familiar enough with the potential impacts of such policies, particularly given the extremely short period of time allowed for producing this report. Thus, companies that do not choose to engage proactively in developing these strategies and framework may be condemned to trying to live with a complex set of decision making criteria that do not reflect real world practicalities.
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