Environmental policies in the US
In the United States, environmental policies are not immune to change. According to the article, they have changed from command and control to market-based motivations and, more recently, to voluntary programs and data disclosure techniques (Ramirez Harrington, 2013). The primary objective of the research is to examine the effectiveness of state legislations and policies in enhancing P2 and decreasing toxic releases. It also seeks to determine the differences in the effectiveness of policy instruments. The last objective of the article is to assess how polluting entities or facilities react to legislation and policy instruments that intend to enhance the adoption of environmental technologies or reduce pollution (Ramirez Harrington, 2013). Pollution prevention technologies or P2 are essential since they permit organizations to go beyond compliance and address strategic objectives.
The National Pollution Prevention Act was developed in 1990, and it was meant to reduce pollution at the source whenever feasible. The act has helped the TRI to gather data yearly on P2 activities undertaken by institutions. Under the EPCRA act, the TRI releases the data to the public to inform them in detail about toxic chemical releases and waste management activities (Ramirez Harrington, 2013). Therefore, TRI help enhance informed decision-making by companies, the government, and the public. In the article, an empirical framework has been utilized. It seeks to determine the connection between the legislation of P2 program and policy instruments and two measures of the environmental performance of an organization, which are the use of environmental technologies and pollution amounts utilizing panel data models in a framework that has a lagged dependent variable. Therefore, the measures used in the context are P2 activities that are being used by an institution and toxic releases by a company at a particular time. The P2 legislation is the dummy variable since it represents various categories of data such as P2 planning, reporting requirement, and numerical objective (Ramirez Harrington, 2013). The model used a sample size of different firms, and the dependent variables are the state legislation and policies. The explanatory variables are P2 legislation choices and the adoption of the policy instruments at the state level.
In conclusion, most regulations for a decrease in pollution focus on P2 programs. It is because these programs offer effective management policies, numerical goals, and reporting requirements. Also, the policy instruments across the state determine the level of P2 adoption and that of toxic releases. Without a doubt, policies implemented by both state and local governments have helped in the preservation of the environment since they have helped in reducing pollution. Also, organizations need to be environmentally responsible and invest in environmental technologies that will aid in the protection of the environment. The role of the government and policymakers is to continually review the efforts being made by companies to reduce or eradicate pollution and improve on policies to make sure that they help these organizations. Pollution is costly, and if not appropriately addressed by policymakers and organizations, it will be hard to control pollution in the future, and both organizations and the government will be adversely impacted economically. Organizations need to make sure that they have long-term plans for their P2 programs so that expertise and knowledge on prevention and eradication of pollution can remain strong.