Toxic releases from paper made with recovered wastepaper versus virgin wood fiber: A research note

Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) data were used to compare average releases (kilograms per metric ton) of paper mills using primarily recovered wastepaper versus mills using primarily virgin wood fiber. Annual releases, for 79 mills, of chlorine, chlorine dioxide, chloroform, acids (hydrochloric and sulfuric), volatile organics (methyl ethyl ketone, methanol, and acetone), and ammonia were compared over the years 1987–1992. Both types of mills reported generally lower toxic releases in 1992 than in 1987; however, toxic releases in all categories were significantly lower from mills using recovered wastepaper than from mills using virgin wood fiber, strongly demonstrating that recycling has added benefits beyond reduced resource consumption. These results suggest that environmental policy should concentrate as much on increasing demand for recycled paper and developing wastepaper collection infrastructure as it does on end-of-pipe pollution abatement.     

美国企业有毒废物排放管理现状及对中国的启示

工业生产中产生的有毒废弃物是我们生活环境的一大危险,每个企业都有责任安全有效地处理其在生产过程中产生的有毒废弃物。美国环保署通过《有毒物质释放清单》的方式,要求工业、企业每年上报其有毒废弃物的产生、管理、排放的详细情况。并对所有数据进行收集、整理、统计、分析后在美国环保署网站上公布。美国这种敦促工业、企业披露其废弃物管理方式的做法可以让公众知晓企业的排污行为,也可以促使企业采取更负责任的方式管理有毒废弃物质。在新形势下,中国即将迎来新一轮区域性结构调整的浪潮,各地政府在产业结构调整的过程中,必须全面考量未来重点发展的行业的环境可持续性。因此,继续建立一个类似于TRI的公开、便捷的各业企业污染物情况数据库,满足各地政府管理地区发展的需要。     

The toxic release inventory: Fact or fiction? A case study of the primary aluminum industry

Since 1989 manufacturing facilities across the USA must report toxic chemical emissions to the EPA's toxic release inventory (TRI). Public release of this information and increased public scrutiny are believed to significantly contribute to the over 45% reduction in toxic chemical releases since inception of the program and to growing support for this type of informational regulation instead of traditional command-and-control. However, prior research indicates a tendency to under-report emissions. We find specific evidence of under-reporting of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) to the TRI by primary aluminum facilities after promulgation of the industry's maximum available control technology (MACT) standard in 1997. We also find evidence of dislocation of emission overseas due to these regulatory requirements. Additionally, changes in energy prices affected aluminum production and further distort reported PAH emissions levels. This suggests the possibility of more widespread under-reporting that is modulated by various factors, including market conditions and new regulations, and which may partially explain the downward trend in TRI emissions. It also suggests that the quality of TRI data may improve once facilities are subject to monitoring of emissions of a TRI listed pollutant due to command-and-control regulation.     

中国化工产业园区化的驱动机制:基于社会-生态系统框架下的博弈论分析

化工产业园区化是政府合理规范化工园区且将化工园区外化工生产企业关停并搬迁至化工园区内的产业集聚化,是解决目前中国化工产业安全事故频发、环境污染严重等问题,推进化工产业转型升级的重要政策之一。中国化工产业园区化的社会—生态系统框架刻画了化工园区、化工产品、化工园区管委会、企业和公众四个核心子系统的关联,在此基础上,中国化工产业园区化的博弈模型将参与者简化为政府(包括化工园区管委会)、企业(化工生产企业)和公众(化工生产企业现址影响半径内的居民群体),并分别构建了政府与企业间的博弈模型与公众参与下的政府与企业间的博弈模型。根据模型推论,此两类情景博弈的纳什均衡都可以为(政府行政政策,企业按期搬迁入园)或(政府经济政策,企业按期搬迁入园)。中国化工产业园区化的驱动机制,是在作为外在驱动主体的政府和公众的引导和监督下,作为内在驱动主体的化工生产企业,在各驱动因素的协同作用下,实现其"按期搬迁入园"的机制。进而得出化工生产企业与化工园区"按期匹配搬迁入园"、提升化工园区公共服务能力、差异化地一企一策及建立公众和企业与政府的三方对话机制的四点政策建议。     

Inducing pollution prevention adoption: effectiveness of the 33/50 voluntary environmental program

The Environmental Protection Agency has encouraged voluntary efforts at pollution prevention by facilities through participation in voluntary environmental programs (VEPs) such as the 33/50 program to reduce toxic releases. This paper examines the effectiveness of the 33/50 program in the adoption of pollution prevention practices and disentangles the effect of adoption from that of program participation on releases of 33/50 chemicals. Using facility-specific panel data and controlling for the endogeneity of program participation and pollution prevention adoption, we find that program participants were 38% more likely to adopt pollution prevention practices than non-participants. Program participants who adopted pollution prevention practices reduced their 33/50 releases by 52% compared to facilities that neither participated nor adopted pollution prevention. This indicates that VEPs that emphasize pollution prevention can play a complementary role in reducing toxic releases.     

Skewed Riskscapes and Environmental Injustice: A Case Study of Metropolitan St. Louis

This article presents a case study of Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) air pollution exposure risks across metropolitan St. Louis. The first section critically reviews environmental justice research and related barriers to environmental risk management. Second, the paper offers a conventional analysis of the spatial patterns of TRI facilities and their surrounding census block group demographics for metropolitan St. Louis. Third, the article describes the use of an exposure risk characterization for 319 manufacturers and their air releases of more than 126 toxic pollutants. This information could lead to more practical resolutions of urban environmental injustices. The analysis of TRIs across metropolitan St. Louis shows that minority and low-income residents were disproportionately closer to industrial pollution sources at nonrandom significance levels. Spatial concentrations of minority residents averaged nearly 40% within one kilometer of St. Louis TRI sites compared to 25% elsewhere. However, one-fifth of the region's air pollution exposure risk over a decade was spatially concentrated among only six facilities on the southwestern border of East St. Louis. This disproportionate concentration of some of the greatest pollution risk would never be considered in most conventional environmental justice analyses. Not all pollution exposure risk is average, and the worst risks deserve more attention from environmental managers assessing and mitigating environmental injustices.     

区域大气污染协作治理的驱动机制研究——以长三角地区为例

区域大气污染协作治理本质上是以地方政府为主体的横向协作行为,地方政府的协作意愿与行动策略是决定区域协作进程的重要因素。本研究通过构建区域大气污染协作治理的驱动模型,分析影响区域协作进程的关键因素。在此基础上,以长三角区域为例,通过分析大气点源治理、移动源管控、重污染天气应急管理和重大活动空气质量保障等四类协作议题的协作进程及其驱动机制,识别差异化协作进程的形成原因。最后,本文从强化地方政府区域协作考核力度、建立区域大气环境生态补偿机制、加强区域协作机构的组织能力建设和完善区域协作治理的基础性技术支撑等四方面为构建区域大气污染防治长效协作机制提出政策建议。     

Perspectives on corporate social responsibility in the chemical sector: A comparative analysis of the Mexican and South African cases

In recent years, the debate on corporate responsibility has shifted from a focus on environmental management towards a broader concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR). This article examines the chemical industry's approach to CSR from the perspective of two emerging economies: Mexico and South Africa. The global chemical industry was one of the first to respond to public concerns about environmental pollution, toxic waste and human health by adopting an industry‐wide code of practice, known as Responsible Care. This article examines the extent to which the chemical industry has responded to the broader debate on CSR. On the basis of a comparative case study, this article argues that the response to social issues by Mexican and South African chemical companies has tended to be limited to the ‘community awareness and emergency response’ (CAER) or community dialogue component of the international voluntary management framework, Responsible Care. Similarities and differences in regulatory and institutional conditions, as well as different levels of civil society engagement, reveal additional limitations for CSR, beyond that of the Responsible Care framework. This article argues that the socio‐political context influences the extent to which companies embrace CSR, especially in emerging economies, and highlights several challenges for the chemical industry in moving forward on CSR: credibility, stakeholder engagement, value‐chain accountability, disclosure and transparency. Reflecting on these challenges, the authors conclude by recommending a renewed focus on: (1) developing a broader set of CSR management practices beyond Responsible Care; (2) institutionalizing stronger accountability measures, such as reporting and verification; and (3) developing multi‐stakeholder partnerships that complement regulation and build public sector regulatory and guidance capacity.     

生猪养殖适度规模:产出、效益与环境——基于全国8省份1484个养殖户数据的实证

近年来，我国生猪养殖市场产生了剧烈波动，也催生了对生猪养殖适度规模问题的思考。本文基于8省份1484份生猪养殖户的调查数据，采用Translog生产函数和C-D生产函数，从产出、效益和环境三个维度对生猪养殖规模效应进行实证研究。研究表明：生猪养殖规模与环境污染之间存在倒“U”形关系；综合考虑产出、效益和环境三个方面，适度规模应为年出栏1000~1999头；养殖经验对生猪养殖的产出和效益影响显著，环保认知和参加培训状况对环境污染影响显著。基于此，积极引导养殖户合理科学扩大养殖规模、增强环境意识，提升生猪养殖从业人员长期经营的驱动力，对促进养殖行业绿色发展具有重要意义。     

Reinventing Environmental Regulation from the Grassroots Up: Explaining and Expanding the Success of the Toxics Release Inventory

/ The success of the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) stands in stark contrast to most other environmental regulations in the United States. Between its inception in 1988 and 1995, releases of chemicals listed on the TRI have declined by 45%. We argue the TRI has achieved this regulatory success by creating a mechanism of "populist maxi-min regulation." This style of regulation differs from traditional command-and-control in several ways. First, the majorrole of public agencies is not to set and enforce standards, but to establish an information-rich context for private citizens, interest groups, and firms to solve environmental problems. Second, environmental "standards" are not determined by expert analysis of acceptable risk, but are effectively set at the levels informed citizens will accept. Third, firms adopt pollution prevention and abatement measures in response to a dynamic range of public pressures rather than to formalized agency standards or governmental sanction. Finally, public pressure ruthlessly focuses on the worst polluters-maximum attention to minimum performers-to induce them to adopt more effective environmental practices. TRI has inadvertently set in motion this alternative style of regulation that has, in turn, dramatically reduced toxics emissions in the United States. By properly understanding the mechanisms that drive TRI's accomplishments, more intentional public policy designs can expand the system of populist maxi-min regulation and achieve even more rapid toxics reduction.     

Progress report on EPA's 33/50 program: Reducing toxic risks through voluntary action 33/50 program office

EPA's 33/50 Program calls for voluntary industry reductions of toxic wastes, aimed at achieving an overall national reduction of 33 percent by 1991 and 50 percent by 1995. The seventeen high-priority toxic chemicals included in the program accounted for 1.4 billion pounds of releases and transfers in 1988; a 50-percent reduction would eliminate 700 million pounds by 1995. As of June 1991, 236 companies have committed to an average reduction commitment of more than 200 million pounds. Thousands more companies are being invited to participate.     

Does the housing market respond to information disclosure?: Effects of toxicity indices in Japan

The policy instruments that provide information on a firm’s or facility’s environmental performance, such as the U.S. Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) and the Pollutant Release and Transfer Register system (PRTRs) used in some European countries and Japan, play an important role in encouraging firms or facilities to improve their environmental performance, if investors, consumers and residents recognize their environmental performance. This study uses a hedonic approach to explore how the Japanese rental housing market responds to carcinogenic risk arising from releases and transfers of chemical substances produced and used at close facilities. We found that residents do not perceive carcinogenic risk generated more than 1.0 km away from their residence and that they seem to recognize the increased carcinogenic risk at distances from 0.5 km to 1.0 km away; a 1% increase in carcinogenic risk reduces the average rent by 0.0007%. The distance at which residents perceive the risk arising from such facilities is less than in previous studies. This suggests that the risk perception recognized in previous studies may capture the other externalities in addition to the chemical risk because the risk is measured by the distance.     

长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率的时空演变及其影响因素研究

本文选取1998—2015年30个省份数据,采用超效率SBM模型测算全国、长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率;采用门槛效应模型研判长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率的影响因素.研究发现:1998—2015年长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率大于全国工业废气污染治理效率;长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率与全国工业废气污染治理效率的演变轨迹相似;长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率空间格局从"两极分化型"向"过渡型"演变;长江经济带沿线11省份工业废气污染治理效率与重工业占比呈负相关;当人均GDP较小时,长江经济带工业废气污染治理效率与工业化率、地方法规颁布件数、环境污染与破坏总次数呈负相关,与群众因污染来信数呈正相关;当人均GDP跨过门槛阈值拐点后,相关关系反之.为进一步推动长江经济带高质量发展,应加强中央与地方政府合作共促工业污染防控治理,推动重化工业绿色发展,加强媒体对废气污染的长期有效监督,推动建立科学有效的"三方共治"体系.     

Environmental democracy in action: The Toxics Release Inventory

The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) created by the 1986 Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act initially received limited attention. During the early years of its implementation, the TRI has become the basis for a national experiment in voluntaristic problem solving among citizens and industry, but that process of environmental democracy hinges on citizens' ability to actually acquire, understand, and apply the new data on industrial toxic emissions. A national study of TRI-using organizations in the public and private sectors reveals that effective citizen access depends in part on the efforts of intermediary public interest groups to bridge individual needs and right-to-know data. Although the TRI has had early success as a supplement to conventional command and control regulation, questions exist about the extent to which state and federal government should or must provide special efforts to make environmental information access work for citizens.     

新型污染物风险防范国际实践及其对中国的启示

随着重化工业的快速发展和各类化学品的大量使用,一些新型污染物对中国居民和生态环境的危害正逐步显现并日趋严重。如何进一步完善中国新型污染物的风险防范体系,是中国生态环境治理面临的重要问题。发达国家新型污染物的风险防范工作启动较早,对中国完善新型污染物风险防范体系具有重要的借鉴意义。本文从制度建设、体制机制、评估监测、科学研究等方面比较国内外新型污染物风险防范实践的异同,立足我国国情,发现国内实践还需加强之处。在此基础上,提出国际新型污染物风险防范实践对中国的启示。     

POLLUTIONAL ASPECTS OF PESTICIDES IN NATURAL STREAMS

The extensive use of synthetic organic pesticides in this country during the past twenty-five years has resulted in widespread pollution of our water resources. An obvious detrimental effect of such pollution has been observed in the numerous fish kills that have occurred. The most widely used pesticides, and the ones that have been implicated in the vast majority of the pollutional episodes, are the chlorinated hydrocarbon insecticides. These compounds, generally speaking, have almost no solubility in water, are subject to very slow microbial degradation if any at all, and are so resistent to natural degradation forces they can persist almost indefinitely in aqueous environments; characteristics that are all detrimental from a stream pollution standpoint. In addition, studies have shown that, as a group, the chlorinated hydrocarbons are more toxic to higher forms of aquatic life than other chemicals widely used for pest control. Because of these undesirable characteristics, present trends are to discontinue using these highly toxic, persistent compounds for pest control in outdoor areas. Legislation banning the sale of DDT has been introduced. Similar legislation controlling the use of several of the chlorinated hydrocarbon pesticides is probably the most effective way to reduce pollution.     

Case studies of ISO 14001: A new business guide for global environmental protection

The intention of this article is to clarify the current status of ISO 14001, the internationally accepted voluntary environmental management system (EMS) standard, which is an effective means to generate continuous environmental performance improvement in an organization as well as significant financial benefits such as operational efficiency improvements (e.g., energy and water savings), reduction in environmental risks and liability expenses, protection of corporate asset value, and public image improvements. The number of “ISO 14001” companies in Europe and the Pacific Rim is steadily increasing with customer and governmental pressure as the driving forces. In the United States, ISO 14001 implementation has lagged behind due to the fact that, so far, the EPA has not supported ISO 14001 as being sufficient for guaranteeing a reliable environmental performance record. Most ISO 14001 certified companies in the United States have been driven by overseas demand, particularly in the microelectronics industry because customers in this industry, especially those in Europe, will simply not do business in the future with companies that are not registered to ISO 14001. It is expected that European demand will continue to push ISO 14001 certification in the United States. Six ISO 14001 case studies in the U.S. chemical, electronics, and plastics industries, along with EPA's attitude toward ISO 14001 are described in this article. The case studies contain the reasons, steps taken, costs, benefits, problems, and future trends of ISO 14001 implementation and certification.     

CHARACTERIZATION OF TOXIC CONDITIONS ABOVE WILSON'S CREEK NATIONAL BATTLEFIELD PARK,MISSOUR1

ABSTRACT: Wilson's Creek has an extensive history of toxicity from both point and nonpoint sources. Seven-day chronic daphnid (Ceriodaphnia dubia) bioassays identified one toxic site in the Wilson's Creek watershed. Procedures for the characterization phase of a Toxicity Identification Evaluation (TIE) were modified for chronic assessment and performed on four water samples from the toxic site. The characterization involved chemical/physical alterations of samples, combined with bioassays, to help in identification of the class(es) of toxicants; followed by chemical analyses. To help understand the additivity of mixtures, toxic units were derived. Successive samples contained concentrations of copper, cadmium, nickel and zinc that literature values describe as being chronically toxic to daphnids. Summed chronic toxic units for these values greatly exceeded ambient toxic units, and more than accounted for observed toxicity. Substantial fluctuations in water quality occurred over the five sampling periods of the characterization studies and a Test of Methods, June through August, 1991. This variability illustrates the difficulty in detecting and documenting nonpoint sources of pollution. Tests using living organisms, in conjunction with toxicity identification methods, on samples taken over time appear to be appropriate for detecting acute and chronic toxicity in areas impacted by intermittent point and nonpoint-source toxicity.     

中国水污染防治40年回顾与展望

改革开放40多年来,我国水污染防治工作取得巨大成效。本文通过回顾我国水污染防治发展历程和总结不同阶段我国流域水污染防治工作特点,提出了面向2035年水生态环境保护的管理建议,以期为2035年美丽中国水环境建设提供参考。     

我国噪声与振动防治行业的发展与市场需求

介绍了国内的声环境现状以及噪声与振动污染防治行业的有关法律法规和相关政策;详细分析了噪声与振动污染防治行业的市场容量以及电力、输变电、城市轨道交通、高速铁路、石化、冶金、民用建筑等行业对噪声控制工程与装备的需求;提出了＂十二五＂期间噪声污染防治行业的发展趋势。