2.2 Environmental risk management  (Page 3/3)

The generally poor state of air quality in the United States was initially tolerated as a necessary condition of an industrialized society. Although the risks of occupational exposure to chemicals was becoming more well known, the science of risk assessment as applied to the natural environment was in its infancy, and the notion that a polluted environment could actually cause harm was slow to be recognized, and even if true it was not clear what might be done about it. Nevertheless, people in the most contaminated areas could sense the effects of poor air quality: increased incidence of respiratory disease, watery eyes, odors, inability to enjoy being outside for more than a few minutes, and diminished visibility.

Environmental degradation of the era was not limited to air quality. Emissions of contaminants to waterways and burial underground were simple and common ways to dispose of wastes. Among the most infamous episodes in pollution history were the periodic fires that floated through downtown Cleveland, Ohio on the Cuyahoga River , causing considerable damage (Figure Cuyahoga River Fire 1969 ), and the discovery of buried hazardous solvent drums in a neighborhood of Niagara Falls, NY in 1978, a former waste disposal location for a chemical company (Figure Love Canal ).

Risk management as a basis for environmental policy

Environmental scientists of the day were also alarmed by the extent and degree of damage that they were documenting. The publication of Silent Spring in 1962 by Rachel Carson (1907-1964), about the impact of the widespread and indiscriminate use of pesticides, was a watershed moment, bringing environmental concerns before a large portion of the American, and global, public. Carson, a marine biologist and conservationist who initially worked for the U.S. Bureau of Fisheries, became a full time nature writer in the 1950s. She collected scientifically documented evidence on the effects of pesticides, particularly DDT , heptachlor , and dieldrin , on humans and mammals, and the systemic disruption they caused to ecosystems. Silent Spring is credited with bringing about a ban on the use of DDT in the United States, and setting in motion a chain of events that would ultimately result in the transformation of environmental public policy from one based on the problems and attitudes that brought about nineteenth century conservation, to one based on the management of risks from chemical toxins. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was established in 1970, just eight years after the publication of Silent Spring . The same year Earth Day was created.

As noted, the modules in the Chapter Modern Environmental Management contain a comprehensive treatment of the major laws and regulations that underpin the risk management approach to environmental policy. However it is worth considering one law in particular at this point, the National Environmental Policy Act of 1970 (NEPA), because it provides a legal basis for U.S. environmental policy, and lays out its terms clearly and unambiguously. NEPA established a national goal to create and maintain "conditions under which [humans] and nature can exist in productive harmony, and fulfill the social, economic and other requirements of present and future generations of Americans [emphasis added]" ( NEPA, 1970 ). Further, NEPA saw the need for long term planning, to "fulfill the responsibilities of each generation as trustee of the environment for succeeding generations," for equity "to assure for all Americans safe, healthful, productive, and esthetically and culturally pleasing surroundings," and for economic prosperity as we "achieve a balance between population and resource use that will permit high standards of living and a wide sharing of life's amenities" ( NEPA, 1970 ). Although the exact word "sustainable" does not appear, NEPA is in all major respects congruent with the goals of the Brundtland Report (written 17 years later, see Chapter Introduction to Sustainability: Humanity and the Environment ), retains the character of American conservation, and anticipates the need to integrate environmental quality with social and economic needs.

Every four to six years the U.S. EPA releases its Report on the Environment , a collection of data and analysis of trends on environmental quality. It is quite comprehensive; reporting on an array of measures that chart progress, or lack thereof, on human impacts on the environment and, in turn, the effects of our actions on human health. It is difficult to summarize all the information available in a concise way, however most measures of human exposure to toxic chemicals, dating in many cases back to the late 1980s, show clear downward trends, in some cases dramatically so (for example DDT in human tissues, lead in blood serum, exposure to hazardous wastes from improper disposal, exposure to toxic compounds emitted to the air). In addition, many of other indicators of environmental quality such as visibility, drinking water quality, and the biodiversity of streams, show improvement. These are success stories of the risk management approach to environmental quality. On the other hand, other measures, such as hypoxia in coastal waters, quantities of hazardous wastes generated, and greenhouse gases released are either not improving or are getting worse.

References

National Environmental Policy Act of 1970, 42 U.S.C., 4321, et seq. (1970). (External Link)