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Waste News
Copyright (C) 2003 Crain Communications, Inc. All rights reserved.
Monday, January 20, 2003
Vol: 8 Num: 21
Cover Story
Liquid solution : Generators can trade credits under EPA plan
Bruce Geiselman Washington --
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency unveiled a controversial plan Jan. 13 to reduce industrial, municipal and agricultural water pollution by instituting a policy that would allow sources of discharges to trade credits.
The EPA will encourage states and tribes to develop their own credit
trading programs.
The environmental community had a mixed reaction. The World Resources
Institute, an environmental policy group, embraced the plan. However,
others, including the Natural Resources Defense Council and
Environmental Defense, criticized it.
The policy will increase the pace and success of water cleanup
projects around the nation, according to EPA Administrator Christie
Whitman.
"Our new Water Quality Trading Policy will result in cleaner water, at
less cost, and in less time," Whitman said. "It provides the flexibility
needed to meet local challenges while demanding accountability to ensure
that water quality does improve."
Water quality trading uses economic incentives to reduce water
pollution. It allows one source to meet its regulatory obligations by
using pollution reductions created by another source that has lower
pollution control costs.
For example, a landowner or farmer could create credits by planting
shrubs and trees next to a stream. A municipal wastewater plant then
could purchase those credits to meet the water quality limits in its
permit, according to the EPA.
The World Resources Institute, in backing the EPA plan, said trading
can be a cheaper answer to solving water quality problems domestically
and abroad.
"It is unusual to find an environmental organization supporting
administration policy, but this is sound environmental policy coming out
of the EPA, and we welcome it," said Paul Faeth, managing director of
the World Resources Institute. "My hope is that this is the
administration's first step toward an overarching policy that restores
confidence in the federal government's commitment to protect public
health and the environment."
Environmental Defense said that while it generally supports pollution
trading systems to enable industry to meet environmental standards, it
has concerns about this EPA plan because it does not include a cap to
limit overall pollution levels. "For trading to be effective, the total
amount of pollution should be capped from all key sources," said Tim
Searchinger, an Environmental Defense attorney. "This cap is at the
heart of this country's successful controls for acid rain. Without a
cap, trades may not reduce pollution, but merely reallocate it among
sources."
The Association of Metropolitan Sewerage Agencies, a national trade
association representing more than 280 publicly owned treatment systems
across the country, applauded the EPA plan for offering its members
increased flexibility and choices in dealing with water quality issues.
"[Publicly owned treatment works] nationwide believe that innovative,
watershed-based approaches must be the centerpieces of ultimately
ensuring the nation's water quality future," said Ken Kirk, AMSA's
executive director.
Contact Waste News government affairs editor Bruce Geiselman at (330)
865-6172 or bgeiselman@crain.com