Assignment #3: Questions 13-15

In the final stretch ...

13) Should public managers and environmental planners engage the public when they know that the public's knowledge is limited about the science of an environmental issue? If so, how would you go about doing that? If not, what are the consequences of not including them?

I firmly believe that in this country we have an obligation to make sure the public is as well-informed as possible, even if the public and the media present challenges to doing so. The public's right to know outweighs all concerns about the difficulty of informing and involving them. The public, for one thing, is the key stakeholder. Those living in the area affected by an environmental issue will be the most effected. The Weston article we read suggests that the public is rather defensive and distrustful toward scientific findings, but that is not an excuse to not work to keep them in the loop. In order to deal with the risk society, public involvement should take a more "communicative approach," but review of EIA literature shows that the public involvement is artificial at best (Pg. 319). The case of the unexploded chemical munitions in the Shepherd and Bowler article is an outline of how to approach public involvement: involve the public early, involve them often, and listen to their opinions. Not taking these steps results in greater distrust and likely attempts by members of the public to hold up or destroy a project.

14) Describe 2-3 environmental problems that you think might be particularly conducive to using contingent valuation. Briefly describe why CV would be appropriate in this case.
Damming of Glen Canyon:
It is an old issue, but environmental groups still rail against the loss of what was considered to be a beautiful natural wonder and seek to have Lake Powell drained. For those who don't know, the government dammed Glen Canyon in the 1950s and 1960s, creating Lake Powell. The dam serves as a water reserve for the arid southwest and generates power. David Brower, director of the Sierra Club when Glen Canyon was dammed, was one of the original proponents of the site. He recommended it in place of another site that would have partially flooded a national park. However, after visiting Glen Canyon, he changed his tune. After its damming, he lamented, "Neither you, nor I, nor anyone else knew it well enough to insist that at all costs it should endure." Since then, legislators who favored the dam, including Morris Udall (Democrat) and Barry Goldwater (Republican), have announced regrets over the decision. The cost of draining the lake, as well as other losses of water storage and power generation, could be measured in a contingent valuation of people's willingness to pay for the restoration of the canyon. A broader knowledge of Glen Canyon, its beauty and Native American history may resonate with respondents, and the "warm glow" feeling described in our readings may be lessened by consideration of taxes (especially during a recession) and the existence of a substitute, namely the Grand Canyon.

Protection of the San Pedro River:
The San Pedro River in southwest Arizona is one of few desert riparian areas left in the state and is an internationally renowned location for bird watching. According to The Nature Conservancy, the area around the river is home to "nearly two-thirds of the avian diversity in the U.S." It is a national conservation area. Further protection of this area would be a good candidate for contingent valuation surveys because respondents would be able to value a riparian area in the desert as well as potential bird-watching. Additionally, alternatives exist, especially for bird watching, so the topic fits well into the guidelines created by the NOAA panel. I think the values respondents place on the river would vary widely, with the highest values coming from parts of the southwest as well as the niche group of bird watchers. Lower values may be the result of a lack of knowledge about the area or not valuing riparian areas in the desert. Also, some people just don't care about bird watching and may not be willing to pay more taxes for increased preservation.


15) Describe 2-3 environmental problems that you think would definitely not be conducive to using contingent valuation. Briefly describe why CV would not be appropriate in this case.
Global warming:
I don't think global warming is specific enough for contingent valuation. It could possibly be broken down into specific areas such as clean air, but things like ice shelfs and melting glaciers in Alaska are going to be difficult to assess. Also, given the political explosiveness of the issue, some people won't be willing to pay more for goods or taxes in exchange for a reduction in the Earth's temperature. Also, because so many of the effects are in the future, willingness to pay will be difficult to determine because the respondent won't be present for the benefit.

Destruction of the Sonoran Desert ecosystem:
As Phoenix and Tucson grow, preservation of the Sonoran Desert decreases. The Sonoran Desert is the most "biologically diverse" desert in North America, according to the Bureau of Land Management. I've heard others argue the world. Like global warming, valuing an entire ecosystem is hard work. It is probably nearly impossible for economists and certainly going to be beyond most average citizens. Concepts like biodiversity and ecosystem importance are complicated. Also, given the rarity of the biodiversity in the desert, there are no real "substitutes" as outlined by the NOAA panel.

How we pay for Superfund cleanups

For my final paper, I am researching legislation in Congress called the "polluter pays" bill, which would help fund the Superfund program, which was started under Carter and revised in 1986. The 1986 legislation provided for a "polluter pays" pool, but the law expired after 10 years and has not been reauthorized. An article from last April, Without Superfund Tax, Stimulus Aids Cleanup, shows one of the ways taxpayers are now footing the cost of the cleanup.

I drank the Kool-Aid

I often find it frustrating that environmental issues, specifically global warming, became so partisan. It baffles me. Isn't everyone for clean air and access to drinkable water? Sure, we may disagree with how aggressive the policies should be, but we don't disagree on the benefit. With global warming, my family tells me I drank the Kool-Aid. Sure, we belong to different political parties, but don't the things that cause global warming also cause decreased air quality? Can't we agree that is a problem?

But finding areas of agreement is harder than it seems. Andrew Revkin, author of the NY Times blog Dot Earth, tries to pinpoint agreement as a starting point for civil conversations about global warming in his post, Back to Basics on Climate and Energy. A reader, who self identifies with the conservative party, calls this out as too simplistic, since people from the same party can't even agree.

"What exists is a whole team, or more accurately a "cloud", formed from social networks, informed only by bloggers and talk show hosts who are willing and eager to engage in a debate to which they refuse to bring any constructive points. At the same time you'll have a number claiming that CO2 isn't a greenhouse gas (which is demonstrably untrue) who then get support or lack of criticism from those who move on to argue that CO2 just isn't the "most important" greenhouse gas. They will get support or lack of criticism from those who then claim that while CO2 IS a greenhouse gas, the climate simply isn't sensitive enough to it for it to matter.

To identify points of agreement with that crowd you'd have to find a point of agreement WITHIN that crowd."

Emphasis added by the reader.

Economic view: Valuing global warming counteractions

The New York Times ran a column over the weekend called A Small Price for a Large Benefit, by Robert H. Frank. Like Chapter 9 in the Vig book, he looks at environmental policy through economic terms. He argues the cost of not trying to slow global warming will be far worse than the cost of taking action now, especially if the estimate that the Earth will warm 9 degrees in the next 100 years is a conservative guess. He considers the cost of carbon, and guesses that a $300 per ton price tag would be sufficient. He then relates this to something Americans care about dearly: the price of gas. It would be a $2.60 gas increase per gallon.

I can already hear people screeching about the recession and the burden a $2.60 gas increase would put on families. Yes, it would. However, Frank is arguing for this increase to be gradual in order to allow people to change their behavior. For a family, this would mean buying a more efficient vehicle. For the auto manufacturing industry, the incentive would exist to build more efficient cars.

What I am struck by as I read the Vig book is the focus on costs. Bush changed laws in order to lessen the cost for factories. In theory, this keeps the price of the good from rising substantially, thereby helping the American public. But the question that I always come back to, no matter how rational it is to keep prices low, is: What is the cost of inaction?

Upcoming local EIA

There will an an environmental assessment for a proposed copper mine in the Santa Rita Mountains near Tucson. A study paid for by the company found that it would not affect Tucson tourism. I don't know much about the Tucson area. Any thoughts?

Chemical weapons case study

In our class discussion on EIA, most of us noted how important it was to have real, honest public input. The first case study showed the Army sought input about disposal of chemical weapons, but never changed its original plan to blow up the harmful weapons. The issue has resurfaced, and again the Army is still focused on blowing up the weapons. The Associated Press reports in "Beleaguered US to blow up its chemical stockpiles" that the Army still plans to blow up the weapons in Kentucky and Colorado, despite public condemnation. The residents interviewed continue to express disbelief that blowing up the weapons is the best and safest method to eliminate the weapons. "It's so scary - just the unknown. I'm not sure I'd trust what is going to happen when they do this," said resident Elise Melrod.

Climatologist on NY Times Dot Earth blog

Andrew Lacis defends human contributions to global warming in Part One and Part Two of "A Scientist's Defense of Greenhouse Warming." Lacis is a NASA scientist and one-time critic of the IPCC report (according to the Times he said it sounded like it was written by "Greenpeace activists.") The opening sentence of part one: "Human-induced warming of the climate system is established fact." He goes on to discuss how the atmosphere works and concludes:

"To understand climate change, it is necessary to know the radiative forcings that drive the climate system away from its reference equilibrium state. These radiative forcings have been analyzed and evaluated by Hansen et al. (2005, 2007). They include changes in solar irradiance, greenhouse gases, tropospheric aerosols, and volcanic aerosols. Of these forcings, the only non-human-induced forcing that produces warming of the surface temperature is the estimated long-term increase by 0.3 W/m2 of solar irradiance since 1750. Volcanic eruptions are episodic, and can produce strong but temporary cooling. All of the other forcings are directly tied to human activity."

While these articles are both interesting, do not miss the comments section. If you've ever talked to someone that doesn't believe in global warming, you will recognize the arguments. The majority of my immediate family argue against global warming. They say things such as "It's a natural cycle" or "How do we know warmer isn't better" and so on. My sister says that science has not unequivocally proved to her that global warming exists. I suspect no amount of science will ever convince my family, evidenced by responses like these to Lacis' articles:

1) Eva in California: "North America set its all time record for snow cover last week. Clearly this is due to out of control global warming."
2) Rebecca in Alaska: "Lacis sounds Kerry-esque 'I was against CO2, before I voted for CO2.' No wonder the public is confused by climate advise from scientists."
3) Walt in Pennsylvania: "We have no idea if climate change will end up being a 'disaster' for humans. It almost certainly will not be a disaster for Planet Earth."
4) Harry in Washington: "What is the 'correct' temperature of the earth and why? History would tell us the Ice Ages have dominated the earths climate. I don't think there is anyone who believes that an ice age would be good."

A timely article in the NY Times

Our homework last week was to compare Obama's environmental policies and practices with past presidents. Interestingly, the New York Times posted an article, "Obama Making Plans to Use Executive Power," on Friday dealing with the exact same topic. The president is planning to use processes Vig talked about, including executive orders and administrative rulemaking, to accomplish some of his goals. "... the Environmental Protection Agency is moving forward with possible regulations on heat-trapping gases blamed for climate change, while a bill to cap such emissions languishes in the Senate." But the article also points out that Obama cannot accomplish some of his initial goals, such as a market-based cap-and-trade system, through administrative methods.

Op/Ed: Obama and presidential actions in environmental policy

His ascension to the presidency was one of hope, one of change. Candidate Barack Obama strongly believed by uniting this country, we could overcome differences and achieve greatness. It was an addicting idea. After his initial victory in Iowa in the Democratic Caucus, he told us, “We are not a collection of red states and blue states; we are the United States of America.” Some predicted his popularity and majorities in both the House of Representatives and the Senate would allow Obama to push through major environmental legislation, as opposed to relying on administrative changes and executive orders like some of his predecessors.

However, hoping to overcome partisanship does not make it a reality. Sadly, much like the last Democratic commander-in-chief, the U.S. Congress blocked many of President Obama’s environmental goals. In January 2010, the New York Times noted that proponents of climate-change legislation, including a cap-and-trade agreement to reduce greenhouse gases, were already scaling back plans after the administration’s early defeat on comprehensive health care reform. Additionally, with the election of Scott Brown, the Democrats lost the “super majority” – 60 votes – in the Senate, making it more difficult to pass environmental policy through Congress. The public, overwhelmed by the “great recession,” grew incensed and took out their frustrations on Congressional Democrats in the midterm elections, making Republicans the majority in the Senate. This change in political power made it all but impossible for President Obama and Congressional Democrats to pass legislation on climate change, including emissions reductions and higher fuel economy standards.

We should not consider Obama’s environmental policy of the past four years in a vacuum. Instead, it is instructive to consider what transpired between 1970 and 2000, as well as in the first eight years of the new millennium. The American public can largely thank itself for pushing environmental policies on to the national stage. In 1970, strong public support helped gain the attention of President Richard Nixon, who declared the 1970s the “environmental decade” and passed major legislation in the early part of his presidency, including the National Environmental Policy Act, the Clean Air Act, and the Endangered Species Act. He also created the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Over time, however, new presidents have altered these landmark decisions, as well as others, to fit into their own agendas.

President Ronald Reagan was the first president to have an “avowedly anti-environmental agenda,” according to environmental-policy expert Norman J. Vig, author and professor emeritus at Carleton College. Reagan saw environmental regulation as a threat to economic development, and worked to undermine past legislation and the EPA by revising regulations, appointing anti-environmental directors to key agencies, and slashing the EPA’s budget by one-third in the early 1980s. Reagan’s pro-business agenda was clearly the model for President George W. Bush’s decisions from 2000 to 2008, but interestingly, Reagan’s cutthroat approach to the environment boosted the environmental movement at the time. The effect: Reagan’s vice president and successor, George H.W. Bush, had to take a decidedly more conservationist approach during the early part of his administration. Like Reagan, Bush Sr. did use appointments to place anti-environmentalists in key positions, although some environmentalists lauded a few of his candidates for their qualifications. Despite his early success in getting the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments through Congress, Bush retrenched. His presidency ended with the United States refusing to commit to reducing carbon dioxide emissions in the 1992 Earth Summit.

With the election of Bill Clinton as president, the first Democrat in a dozen years, environmentalists were hopeful of major policy change. Vig notes that Clinton had goals to raise fuel economy standards, promote research, pass a new Clean Water Act, and revise President Carter’s Superfund program. He created a new Office of Environmental Policy and the President’s Council on Sustainable Development. Despite these early successes, Clinton lacked the support Nixon had from the American public. Additionally, Congress overran his agenda, and forced Clinton to take defensive action on behalf of the environment rather than offensive. His battles with Congress led Clinton to use the powers of the president to push through meaningful change, including new and expanded national monuments and protection of 60 million acres of land by an executive order at the 11th hour of his presidency.

Taking cues from Reagan’s pro-business slant and Clinton’s use of administrative powers, the second President Bush used his eight years to boost private interests. Like Reagan, he chose directors whose fortes were more business than environment. Like Clinton, he used executive orders to push his goals, but unlike Clinton, the purpose of Bush’s executive orders was to roll back environmental protections, including provisions of the Clean Air Act. Bush pushed through tax breaks for energy producers, promoted oil and gas exploration, and withdrew the country from the Kyoto Treaty. Bush’s control over environmental policy also “frequently overrode scientific and technical considerations,” Vig wrote in a paper on presidential powers and the environment. He ignored climate-change science, particularly at the beginning of his presidency, and evidence from a Gallup poll showed that during the first five years of President Bush’s administration, Republicans believed less and less that the effects of global warming had already started. Two major environmental-policy debacles marred President Bush’s presidency: mercury emissions and rejection of a waiver for California to regulate greenhouse gases. The former is evidence of the administration’s willingness to alter scientific findings in order to pursue more business-friendly outcomes. The latter, evidence that officials appointed to environmental departments were merely puppets of the administration.

After the election, Obama made some major headway in the environmental policy arena. He ordered the EPA to reconsider the California waiver, and on June 30, 2009, the EPA approved the waiver, paving the way for California and other states to create plans to regulate climate-change gases. In February 2009, he passed an economic stimulus package with $80 billion for renewable energy and mass transit. The Nobel Peace Prize committee recognized Obama for changing the conversation in the United States about climate change.

Obama also achieved success, albeit more limited than originally sought, when Congress passed a “cap-and-dividend” plan sponsored by Senators Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., and Susan Collins, R-Maine, in 2010. The bipartisan bill auctions permits for carbon emissions, which firms purchase. The government then uses the money gained through the auction as a credit for taxpayers to offset increasing costs by firms that purchase the permits. While it remains difficult for Obama to push anything through the Legislature, it is successes like the cap-and-dividend bill that show it is still possible, even without a “super majority” in the Senate. However, if the President continues to be stonewalled by Congress in his second term, he may need to resort to past presidents’ administrative methods to bully through important climate change prevention measures.

The article I used for my Op/Ed piece

Here is the link to the article I used for my op/ed piece: Advocates of Climate Bill Scale Down Their Goals

The New York Times reported on Jan. 26 that proponents of climate-change legislation are scaling back plans because of concerns about passing bills in the Senate. The catalyst of the fear stems from the election of Scott Brown, a Republican, to replace the late Ted Kennedy, a Democrat. The election of a Republican means that the Democrats no longer have a "super majority" in the Senate, and Republicans will be able to successfully use filibusters because Democrats don't have the votes to stop them.

The article reiterates President Obama's commitment to reducing carbon emissions by 17 percent less than 2005 levels by 2020, a pretty dramatic change from President Bush, who largely ignored the concern of global warming and denied California (and other states) a waiver to further reduce greenhouse gases associated with global warming. President Clinton, who set out to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, failed in the end to convince Congress to pass legislation for major reductions. Similar problems appear to be creeping up for Obama. Senator John Kerry all but says that cap-and-trade, a major piece of the legislation to reduce emissions, likely won't pass in 2010.

Overall, I agree with President Obama's stance on methods to reduce pollution and attempts to slow global warming. My concern is that legislation will get bogged down by amendments and pork, so it won't be as effective as it should be. Time will tell, but my suspicion is Obama will need to resort to executive orders, like Clinton and the second Bush, to make significant environmental policy changes.