Environmental audits or self-audits are undertaken by a company or specialists it hires to evaluate its compliance with environmental laws and regulations, uncover any problems and correct them.
The incentive for companies to conduct such audits is the ever-present possibility of future lawsuits from environmental groups or criminal prosecution by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). However, any information a company gathers from such voluntary efforts can be used against it in court; therefore companies are reluctant to conduct them.
A solution supported by many businesses and legislators is to bar the use of audit evidence when the company acts in good faith, promptly reports any violations and acts to correct them.
Bills before Congress (H.R. 1047 and S. 582) would give audit information a limited privilege from discovery or admission into evidence in civil lawsuits and provide limited immunity when an audit is disclosed to the government.
Self-assessments are also performed by companies with respect to employment discrimination, securities law, health and safety. There is support for extending the concept of privilege and immunity to those types of audits as well.
Source: "Self-Audits and Self-Plaudits," Judicial/Legislative Watch Report, Vol. 17, No. 3, March 1996, National Legal Center for the Public Interest, 1000 16th Street, NW, Suite 301, Washington, DC 20036, (202) 296-1683.
Some scientists are up in arms about a report issued last week by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a United Nations organization. They claim that the report issued -- entitled "The Science of Climate Change 1995"-- was not the same report peer-reviewed and approved earlier by an international body of scientists whose names appear on the title page.
Nearly all of the changes made in the report worked to remove hints of the skepticism with which many scientists regard global warming claims. Former head of the National Academy of Sciences Frederick Seitz says he has never witnessed "a more disturbing corruption of the peer-review process ..."
Critics cite these passages as examples of those included in the approved report and later deleted from the published version:
Apparently, more than 15 sections in a key chapter which set out the scientific evidence for and against a human influence over climate were changed or deleted after scientists charged with examining this question had accepted the supposedly final text. Nothing in IPCC Rules permits anyone to change a specific report after it has been accept by the panel of scientific contributors and the full IPCC, but this is exactly what happened.
Experts say policy makers and the press around the world will likely view the report as a basis for critical decisions on energy policy that would have an enormous impact on U. S. oil and gas prices and on the international economy.
Source Frederick Seitz (Rockefeller University and George C. Marshall Institute), "A Major Deception on 'Global Warming," Wall Street Journal, June 12, 1996.
The Senate will vote soon on a bill that promotes environmental protection, preserves a fundamental civil right and does so at minimal, if any, additional cost to the government.
However, "The Omnibus Property Rights Act of 1995" (S.605), has been decried by critics as a radical assault on federal health and environmental laws. They claim that the law would make it almost impossible to protect endangered species or halt wetland losses.
Supporters say these claims are nonsense and their proponents know it.
The Property Rights Act would making it easier for property owners to defend their rights by allowing them to get justice in federal courts. Under current law, if regulators designate property as a wetland and deny the owner the right to build, he has two options.
In a "Catch-22," the government will urge the federal district court to dismiss a plaintiff's claim for equitable relief on the grounds that he should seek compensation in a federal claims court. At the same time, it will urge the federal claims court to dismiss his claim on the grounds that he should seek equitable relief in a federal district court. This act would allow certain federal courts to hear both types of suits, ending this practice.
S. 605 also requires that when an environmental law, such as the Endangered Species Act or the wetlands section of the Clean Water Act, reduces the value of a person's property by 33 percent or more the government must compensate him.
Numerous wetlands are on private land, and more than 75 percent of the endangered species depend on private land for all or part of their habitats. Yet current laws discourage people from creating, enhancing or preserving wetlands or species habitat. Tragically, there is mounting evidence that fear of government regulation is driving landowners to destroy potential habitat for endangered species to avoid attracting them.
Source: H. Sterling Burnett (environmental policy analyst, National Center for Policy Analysis) , "Endangered Property," Washington Times, June 19, 1996.
The Environmental Protection Agency has released a draft report that congratulates itself on great things it has done for the economy and the environment.
From 1970 to 1990, the report claims, the economic benefit of environmental regulations returned $20 for every $1 taxpayers were forced to spend on cleaning the air. The total estimated net benefits to the economy during the 20-year period were about $7 trillion -- or the size of America's gross national product for one year.
The report is issued pursuant to a requirement in the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments that EPA analyze the cost and benefits of past, present and future clean air regulations.
Critics point to a number of flaws in the report and its methodology, however.
One analysis of federal regulations between 1990 and 1995 reveals that only 23 of 54 regulations examined would pass a cost-benefit test based on the government's numbers. Experts estimate that getting rid of regulations that do not pass a cost-benefit test could save $100 billion.
Source: Robert W. Hahn (American Enterprise Institute), "The EPA's True Cost," Wall Street Journal, June 27, 1996.
Predictions of global warming are based on computer models of the earth's climate and are thus subject to uncertainties. For example, a United Nations panel of scientists concluded last fall that greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide are probably responsible, at least in part, for a changing global climate.
The models predict that if emissions of the gases are not reduced, the average global temperature will increase by 1.8 to 6.3 degrees Fahrenheit -- with a best estimate of 3.6 degrees -- by the year 2100.
Among the scientists who criticize these computer models is Richard S. Lindzen, a professor of meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He points out that:
To test the climate system's sensitivity to change, Lindzen is exploring the effects of volcanic eruptions. If the climate is not very sensitive, the cooling effect produced by the haze from eruptions should dissipate quickly. If it is very sensitive, the effect should linger. So far, he reports, it appears that the volcanoes are indicating low sensitivity.
Many other scientists are skeptical about global warming, according to William Gray of Colorado State University. John M. Wallace of the University of Washington questions assertions that climate change has already taken place.
Lindzen predicts that in five or 10 years direct observations of the climate's behavior may provide enough information to show whether serious climate change is likely or not.
Source: William K. Stevens, "A Skeptic Asks: Is It Getting Hotter or Is It Just the Computer?" New York Times, June 18, 1996.