State and federal air toxics developments: disclosure strategies overtake regulation.

Abstract

This article surveys selected state programs in an attempt to go beyond data in EPA's National Air Toxics Information Clearinghouse (NATICH). It concludes that emergent state regulatory efforts are shaped by, but separable from, EPA's dual struggle to clarify complex statutory provisions and to manage nationwide programs rather than operate those programs or be charged with destruction through delegation. It also concludes that these state programs will be profoundly affected by a related development-the growing use of strategies that rest on broad public disclosure to reduce toxic emissions or releases, relying on sunlight instead of rules or permits as the primary environmental tool. Both these trends-toward new types of state regulatory programs and nonregulatory public disclosure of toxic releases-seek to avoid the cumbersome, costly catch-ups of conventional regulation. And both seem sure to continue, for they are elicited by the third generation nature of the toxics problem itself. They suggest how environmental protection is likely to evolve in analogous areas over the coming years.