Pollution Right

Polluting, or contaminating, the environment is widely recognized as an undesirable by-product of both good and bad activities. For instance, animal waste in a stream could be an undesirable effect of the desirable activity of raising cattle. Similarly, the production of power in power plants is a beneficial and necessary activity, yet such plants emit significant amounts of the pollutants sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, carbon dioxide, and mercury. Many industries emit harmful products and gases into the environment, all of which are either man-made or facilitated products of manufacturing. Barring a technological miracle, a certain amount of pollutants in the environment is a necessary evil in many activities.

The fact that pollutants are viewed as an acceptable by-product of certain activities that are desirable to the economy gives rise to the precept that, at least to a certain degree, people have a right to pollute. Understandably, many individuals and groups concerned with the environment seek to limit that right. Some of the many issues related to the right to pollute are the following: To what degree is pollution acceptable? What kinds of pollution are tolerable? and What are the means for limiting such pollution?

Federal and state governments have attempted to provide answers to these questions, in part, by setting limits on the amount of pollutant emissions that companies may acceptably produce and levying fines against those companies that are out of compliance with such levels or even types of pollutants. For example, federal legislation provides that a power plant be allowed to emit a certain level of sulfur dioxide. Legislation also provides that credits for the right to pollute be distributed at no cost to power companies. All pollution emitted by the power companies reduces their allocation of pollution credits. If a company successfully reduces its emissions to amounts below the prescribed allowable levels, the remaining credits can be banked for later use by the company in its existing or potentially expanded operations. Alternatively, such pollution credits may be traded, or sold, to other companies that are still exceeding the required maximum emission levels under the federal statute, thus enabling such businesses to continue in existence rather than allowing regulation to result in their closure. These marketable pollution rights allow businesses to sell the right to pollute to one another.

Although the right to pollute is thus legally traded, the question of the ethics of such trading confronts society on many levels. Research claims that more African Americans than whites live near power plants, thus exposing them to greater pollution risks. The fact [Page 1626]that power plants are allowed to purchase the right to pollute means that such a right may affect African Americans at a greater rate than whites, leading to allegations of discrimination against such a right. Pollution rights given to businesses enable industry to cut the costs of polluting, but it is arguable whether the sale of pollution rights results in any significant decrease in pollution overall. The caps on emissions themselves are the vehicle designed to decrease pollution. However, if a plant is emitting pollutants at a greater level than the cap allows, significant fines can be avoided by purchasing the right to pollute in excess of such a level at a lower cost to the business than the potential fine. This situation encourages the economic growth of industry but may not have the desired effect on the overall reduction of pollution levels, at least in certain areas.

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