Valuing Clean Air : The EPA and the Economics of Environmental Protection

The passage of the Clean Air Act and the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1970 marked a sweeping transformation in American politics. In a few short years, the environmental movement pushed Republican and Democratic elected officials to articulate a right to clean air as part of a bevy of new federal guarantees. Charged with delivering on those promises, the EPA represented a bold assertion that the federal government had a responsibility to protect the environment, the authority to command private business to reduce their pollution, and the capacity to dictate how they did so. In Valuing Clean Air, Charles Halvorson examines how the environmental concern that propelled the Clean Air Act and the EPA coincided with economic convulsions that shook the liberal state to its core. Business groups, public interest organizations, think tanks, and a host of other actors, including Ralph Nader, wasted little time after the EPA's creation in identifying and trying to pull the new levers of power. As powerful businesses pressed to roll back regulations, elected officials from both political parties questioned whether the nation could keep its environmental promises. In response, the EPA's staff and leadership practiced a politics of the possible, adopting a monetized approach to environmental value that shieflded the agency's rulemaking but sat at odds with environmentalist notions of natural rights and contributed to the elevation of economics as the language and logic of policy. As Halvorson demonstrates, environmental protection came to serve as a central battleground in larger debates over markets, government, and public welfare. For anyone who has wondered where cap and trade came from and how environmental activists came to discuss wetlands protection, air pollution, and fracking in the language of cost-benefit analysis, Valuing Clean Air provides an insightful look at a half-century of the making of US environmental policy. -- From dust jacket "The passage of the Clean Air Act and the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1970 marked a sweeping transformation in American politics. In a few short years, the environmental movement pushed Republican and Democratic elected officials to articulate a right to clean air as part of a bevy of new federal guarantees. Charged with delivering on those promises, the EPA represented a bold assertion that the federal government had a responsibility to protect the environment, the authority to command private business to reduce their pollution, and the capacity to dictate how they did so. But revolutions are always contested and the starburst of environmental concern that propelled the Clean Air Act and the EPA coincided with economic convulsions that shook the liberal state to its core. As powerful businesses pressed to roll back regulations, elected officials from both parties questioned whether the nation could keep its environmental promises. Pushing on, the EPA adopted a monetized approach to environmental value that sat at odds with environmentalist notions of natural rights but provided a critical shied for the agency's rulemaking, as environmental protection came to serve as a key battleground in larger debates over markets, government, and public welfare. The EPA's success and the potential limits of its monetary approach are evident in the very air we breathe today - far cleaner and healthier as a result of the EPA's actions, but holding new threats in a rapidly changing climate"-- Provided by publisher Cover Valuing Clean Air Copyright Dedication Contents Acknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction: Save EPA 1. The Costs of Pollution 2. The Doer: The EPA and the Power in Implementation 3. A Balancing Act: Regulatory Review 4. Put the Profit Motive to Work: Regulatory Reform 5. Are You Tough Enough? Deregulation 6. Markets for Bads: Cap-​and-​Trade and the New Environmentalism Epilogue: The EPA and a Changing Climate Notes Bibliography Index Introduction : save EPA -- The costs of pollution -- The doer : power in implementation -- A balancing act : regulatory review -- Putting the profit motive to work : regulatory reform -- Are you tough enough? : deregulation -- Markets for bads : cap-and-trade and the new environmentalism -- Epilogue : the EPA and a changing climate 'Valuing Clean Air' offers a sustained historical study of the EPA. It argues for the role and the significance of environemental regulation in modern American history and explores the roots and evolution of environmental economics based on EPA archival material and rarely published interviews