Summertime NOx Emissions Cap Must Continue Year-Round: Why Cancer Risks Of Air Pollution Should Make EPA Think Again, Says RFF 3/6/2002
From: Dallas Burtraw, 202-328-5087 or Melinda Wittstock, 202-328-5019, both of Resources for the Future (RFF) WASHINGTON, March 6 -- Disturbing new research published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association that breathing the air in the nation's most polluted metropolitan areas significantly raises the risk of cancer and other life-threatening illnesses should make the Environmental Protection Agency think again about its plans to reduce nitrogen oxide emissions from electricity generation, says energy and climate change economist Dallas Burtraw. The EPA plans to implement a seasonal cap on NOx emissions in 19 eastern states and Washington, D.C., but Burtraw says the EPA's "summer ozone experiment" should run all year-round. "Public health scientists and economists recognize that exposure to fine particulates in the air is the greatest environmental threat to public health that our nation faces. It is ironic that the summertime cap and trade ozone program will leave billions of dollars in pollution control equipment unused during 7 months of the year, leaving more serious problem of exposure to fine particulates from NOx continue unabated," says Burtraw. "It's not good public policy to require firms to invest in and install new controls for NOx emissions and then only run that equipment on a seasonal basis," says Burtraw, a senior fellow with the independent environment and energy research institute Resources for the Future (RFF). Burtraw has found overwhelming evidence that an annual emission cap would yield net societal benefits (that is, health benefits minus the capital and variable costs of post-combustion controls on NOx emissions) that are at least as great as those expected from the EPA's seasonally-based NOx trading program. Burtraw has found the net benefits would increase by $724 million annually -- and might increase by as much as $3 billion per year (1997 dollars). He also found that while 11 northeastern states benefit the most under an annual program, under no scenario would the remaining eight states be worse off with an annual approach. Burtraw, an emissions trading and electricity restructuring expert, has conducted dozens of briefings on Capitol Hill, for EPA staff and managers, and interested stakeholders and policymakers around the U.S. His findings are drawn from a decade of research that has been presented in six peer-reviewed articles, and also draws on dozens of related scholarly publications. His analysis is based on methodological and modeling assumptions that are described fully in his paper, 'Uncertainty and the Cost-Effectiveness of Regional Nox Emissions Reductions from Electricity Generation'. (http://www.rff.org/disc(underscore)papers/abstracts/0201.htm, http://www.rff.org/disc(underscore)papers/PDF(underscore)files/02 01.pdf) For more information: http://www.rff.org |