Center for Progressive Reform Member Scholar and University of Texas School of Law professor David Adelman has written an article for the Indiana Law Journal entitled,"The Collective Origins of Toxic Air Pollution: Implications for Greenhouse Gas Trading and Toxic Hotspots." According to the abstract:
This Article presents the first synthesis of geospatial data on toxic air pollution in the United States. Contrary to conventional views, the data show that vehicles and small stationary sources emit a majority of the air toxics nationally. Industrial sources, by contrast, rarely account for more than ten percent of cumulative cancer risks from all outdoor sources of air toxics. This pattern spans multiple spatial scales, ranging from census tracts to the nation as a whole. However, it is most pronounced in metropolitan areas, which have the lowest air quality and are home to eighty percent of the U.S. population.
The secondary status of industrial facilities as sources of air toxics has important implications for the current debate over cap-and-trade regulation—the policy instrument of choice for controlling greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions responsible for climate change. Environmental justice advocates have opposed GHG trading in significant part because it could exacerbate inequitable exposures to toxic co-pollutants, not GHGs themselves, in minority and low-income communities.
The likelihood of such disparities occurring has remained an open empirical question. The geospatial data reveal that, apart from a few readily identifiable census tracts, the potential for GHG trading to cause toxic hotspots is extremely low. Moreover, for the few jurisdictions in which disparities cannot be ruled out, targeted policies exist to prevent them without compromising market efficiency.
The article can be read in full here and prompted responses from CPR Member Scholars Dave Owen and Alice Kaswan.
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Erin Kesler | September 9, 2013
Center for Progressive Reform Member Scholar and University of Texas School of Law professor David Adelman has written an article for the Indiana Law Journal entitled,”The Collective Origins of Toxic Air Pollution: Implications for Greenhouse Gas Trading and Toxic Hotspots.” According to the abstract: This Article presents the first synthesis of geospatial data on toxic […]
Alice Kaswan | September 9, 2013
I agree with David Owen’s recent blog post that David Adelman’s article, The Collective Origins of Toxic Air Pollution: Implications for Greenhouse Gas Trading and Toxic Hotspots, makes significant contributions to our awareness of the sources of toxic pollution and our collective responsibility for reducing emissions. He focuses on the distributional implications of GHG trading […]
Dave Owen | September 9, 2013
For years, environmental activists have worried that emissions trading systems will create “hot spots.” The fear, in a nutshell, is that even if the trading system succeeds in reducing overall levels of pollutants, pollution levels in areas with lots of emissions purchasers will rise. It seems quite plausible to anticipate that the areas seeing increases […]
Rena Steinzor | September 4, 2013
We’ve often written in this space about the Obama Administration’s very bad idea to take federal inspectors of the line at poultry processing plants, leaving the discovery of blood, guts, and feathers on the carcasses to overworked and underpaid line workers forced to process as many as 70 birds per minute at the average plant. The […]
Dave Owen | September 3, 2013
Last week, the Court of Appeals of Texas, Fourth District handed down Bragg v. Edwards Aquifer Authority, a decision that anyone interested in takings or water law ought to read (the Lexis cite is 2013 Tex. App. LEXIS 10838). The Braggs had brought a takings claim alleging that the Edwards Aquifer Authority’s regulatory restrictions on the Braggs’ […]
Ross Eisenbrey | August 28, 2013
No week seems to go by without an imbalanced attack on regulatory protections by a trade association, a “think-tank,” a member of Congress, or a journalist. These attacks frequently feature a reference to the growth in the Code of Federal Regulations, even though it is a meaningless measure of whether we’re overregulated. In offering another […]
Michael Patoka | August 27, 2013
In January of this year, the Food & Drug Administration proposed a rule on produce safety, as required by the 2011 Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA). The rule would establish comprehensive standards designed to prevent foodborne illnesses linked to fruits, vegetables, and nuts—like the ongoing Cyclospora outbreak that has sickened 630 people so far, or […]
Wendy Wagner | August 26, 2013
In 2005, the City of Austin discovered that coal-tar based asphalt sealant was killing the highly endangered Barton Springs salamander. The sealant was leaching off freshly sealed parking lots and entering downstream pools where these fragile animals live. The surprise ending to the City’s detective work was not only that the sealant was gradually destroying its river […]
Thomas McGarity | August 23, 2013
After more than two years of White House review, OSHA has finally published its proposed new standards for silica exposure. Secretary of Labor Tom Perez, Assistant Secretary David Michaels, and many other people both inside and outside the agency deserve congratulations for finally shaking the proposal loose from the clutches of the president’s regulatory review team […]