Voluntary Environmental Programs

Voluntary Environmental Programs
Author: Peter DeLeon
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 320
Release: 2010
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780739133224

Protecting the environment is often not the primary objective of businesses. As the world has become more environmentally aware, the necessity of environmental regulations becomes apparent. Voluntary Environmental Programs: A Policy Perspective examines different approaches to environmental protection in business. Typically, environmental improvements on the part of industry result from government regulations that command certain action from industry and then control how well it performs. An alternative approach is voluntary environmental agreements, where firms voluntarily commit to make certain environmental improvements individually, as part of an industry association, or under the guidance of a government entity. For example, many new initiatives targeting climate change originate from companies that voluntarily commit to reduce their carbon output or footprint.

Voluntary Greenhouse Gas Reduction Programs Have Limited Potential

Voluntary Greenhouse Gas Reduction Programs Have Limited Potential
Author: Jill Ferguson
Publisher: DIANE Publishing
Total Pages: 35
Release: 2009-02
Genre:
ISBN: 1437908063

This review evaluates the extent to which the EPA¿s Greenhouse Gas (GHG) voluntary programs can significantly reduce future GHG emissions, and whether their data is complete and reliable. The set of voluntary GHG programs reviewed use outreach efforts to recruit program partners and reduce GHG emissions. The greatest barriers to participation were the perceived emission reduction costs and reporting requirements. It is unlikely that these voluntary programs can reduce more than 19% of the projected 2010 GHG emissions for their industry sectors. If EPA wishes to reduce GHG emissions beyond this point, it needs to consider additional policy options. Includes recommendations. Charts and tables.

The New Environmental Regulation

The New Environmental Regulation
Author: Daniel J. Fiorino
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 305
Release: 2006
Genre: Law
ISBN: 0262062569

Winner, 2007 Louis Brownlow Award presented by the National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA) and 2006 Best Book in Environmental Management and Policy, American Society for Public Administration. Environmental regulation in the United States has succeeded, to a certain extent, in solving the problems it was designed to address; air, water, and land, are indisputably cleaner and in better condition than they would be without the environmental controls put in place since 1970. But Daniel Fiorino argues in The New Environmental Regulationthat—given recent environmental, economic, and social changes—it is time for a new, more effective model of environmental problem solving. Fiorino provides a comprehensive but concise overview of U.S. environmental regulation—its history, its rationale, and its application—and offers recommendations for a more collaborative, flexible, and performance-based alternative. Traditional environmental regulation was based on the increasingly outdated assumption that environmental protection and business are irreversibly at odds. The new environmental regulation Fiorino describes is based on performance rather than on a narrow definition of compliance and uses such policy instruments as market incentives and performance measurement. It takes into consideration differences in the willingness and capabilities of different firms to meet their environmental obligations, and it encourages innovation by allowing regulated industries, especially the better performers, more flexibility in how they achieve environmental goals. Fiorino points to specific programs—including the 33/50 Program, innovative permitting, and the use of covenants as environmental policy instruments in the Netherlands—that have successfully pioneered these new strategies. By bringing together such a wide range of research and real world examples, Fiorino has created an invaluable resource for practitioners and scholars and an engaging text for environmental policy courses.