EPA at 40: Bringing EnvironmentalProtection into the 21st CenturyJ O S E P H F I K S E L *

The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio

T H O M A S G R A E D E L

Yale Universiy, New Haven, Connecticut

A L A N D . H E C H T

Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC

D A V I D R E J E S K I

Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars,Washington, DC

G A R Y S . S A Y L E R

University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tennessee

P E T E R M . S E N G E

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge,Massachusetts

D E B O R A H L . S W A C K H A M E R

University of Minnesota, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota

T H O M A S L . T H E I S

University of Illinois, Chicago, Illinois

Sustainability science suggests that effective environmentalprotection requires an integrated systems approach.It has been 40 years since the passage of the NationalEnvironmental Policy Act (NEPA; signed into law January 1,1970), which established a broad environmental policy forthe United States, and the formation of the EnvironmentalProtection Agency (EPA). Anticipating the agency’s 40thbirthday on December 2, 2010 provides an opportunity totake stock of its past successes and future challenges.

Since 1970, important advances in environmental pro-tection, product design, and occupational safety have beenprompted by problem-, media-, and chemical-specificlegislation. Our air and water are now cleaner, less pollutionis being produced, and many waste sites are being restored.Yet despite such significant progress, it has become clearthat the new century’s problems are more complex andinvolve multiple environmental media and stressors: theytherefore require new kinds of interdisciplinary thinking andsystems solutions.

Today, the resilience of both human society and thenatural environment are being tested on a global level bypressures of population and economic growth, which have

in turn led to increasing greenhouse gas emissions, decliningbiodiversity, and other threats to such vital natural resourcesas fresh water, soil, forests, and wetlands. The threats wereclearly delineated in the 2005 Millennium Ecosystem As-sessment, which determined that 15 of 24 global ecosystemservices are being degraded or used unsustainably (1).

It is also becoming clear that the forces influencing humanand ecological health are systemic and interdependent. Thescientific and regulatory communities are struggling to dealwith impacts of changes in climate, land use, and ecosystems;faster technological change and emergence of biotechnologyand nanotechnology; cumulative and possibly synergisticeffects from exposure to multiple compounds; and concernsabout bioaccumulative toxicants and nonpoint pollutionsources.

All of these stressors suggest that it is time to launch anew dialogue on science and the environment. How canscience best address these problems, and what critical nextsteps are needed to move environmental science into the21st century? History shows an early recognition of multiplestressors acting on the environment and the need to addressthem in an integrated manner. It is urgent today to investigateand determine how best to address this need.

Evolution of Environmental Science and Policy

At the beginning of the 20th century, the first environmentalmovement in the U.S. was led by a diverse coalition ofconservationists and business leaders seeking to preserve andmanage land resources for their most valuable uses. Both groupssaw the need for the government to intervene in the marketwith new laws and regulations, especially on government-owned lands. The legislation that set aside land for the firstnational park at Yellowstone called for the Department of

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Interior to preserve in their natural conditions the park’s timber,mineral deposits, and natural wonders (2).

The early environmental movement was also advancedby scientific research on health, occupational hazards, andair pollution. The research in turn generated attention andpolitical debate on the respective roles of government andthe private sector. Subsequent events highlighted the linkageof economic activities to health and safety. For example, in1948, a temperature inversion trapped toxic gases from zincand steel plants in Donora, Pennsylvania; 20 people diedand approximately half of the town’s 14,000 residents becameill (3). In 1969 the Cuyahoga River oil-slick fire drew nationalattention to environmental problems in the Great Lakesregion and elsewhere in the U.S.

Events like these prompted the launch of a second envi-ronmental movement that focused less on conservation andmore on short-term risks faced by humans in their everydaylives. U.S. environmental policy advanced the concept of riskmanagement as a basis for policy actions. Social and urbanjustice movements concerned with public health played acritical role in shaping the 20th century environmental move-ment and subsequent passage of federal and state environ-mental laws (4). At the same time, environmental stressors suchas population growth, urban development, and industrialpollution motivated the enactment of NEPA, the creation ofEPA, and the first international environmental conference inStockholm in 1972.

National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the AshCouncilNEPA’s enactment in 1970 formally established as a nationalgoal the creation and maintenance of “conditions underwhich [humans] and nature can exist in productive harmony,and fulfill the social, economic and other requirements ofpresent and future generations of Americans [emphasisadded]” (5)slanguage remarkably similar to the UN-sponsored Brundtland Report’s definition of “sustainabledevelopment” 17 years later (6).

NEPA required the federal government to act in fourspecific areas:

• Long-term Planning: “fulfill the responsibilities of eachgeneration as trustee of the environment for succeedinggenerations”

• Equity: “assure for all Americans safe, healthful, pro-ductive, and esthetically and culturally pleasing sur-roundings”

• Widespread Prosperity: “achieve a balance betweenpopulation and resource use that will permit highstandards of living and a wide sharing of life’s amenities”

• Resource Management: “enhance the quality of renew-able resources and approach the maximum attainablerecycling of depletable resources.”

How NEPA’s vision could be implemented was addressedby the President’s Advisory Council on Executive Organizationchaired by Roy L. Ash (the Ash Council). Recognizing that the“national Government (sic) is neither structured nor orientedto sustain a well-articulated attack on the practices which debasethe air we breathe, the water we drink, and the land that growsour food,” the Council proposed and outlined the structure ofa new administrative agency that would carry out nationalenvironmental policy (7). It recommended that antipollutionprograms from five federal departments be combined in a newEnvironmental Protection Agency (EPA) that would “recognizethe interrelated nature of pollution problems” and be theprincipal instrument for meeting this challenge (7).

Unfortunately, in the decades that followed, a lack ofcoherence in federal environmental legislation made itincreasingly difficult to pursue an integrated approach toenvironmental management. Unlike NEPA and the Pollution

Prevention Act of 1990, the media- or subject-specificenvironmental laws have been described as so “fragmentedand unrelated as to defy overall description” (8).

The U.S. is now facing many of the same stresses thatconfronted the Ash Council in 1970, but society today needsto recognize these stresses’ more complex and interrelatednature. Continued focus on media-specific problems willnot solve pollution problems, but simply shift them fromone medium to another (e.g., from air to water). Theexperience of many states demonstrates that a media-basedapproach misses about half of the emissions of a typicalfacility compared to the findings of integrated permitting.Research in the Great Lakes and other major bodies of watershows that toxic pollution comes from many sources: airdeposition, sediment, groundwater, and land runoff (9).

Despite the Ash Council’s recognition of the need toaddress environmental problems in an integrated manner,the initial EPA structure organized by separate media haspersisted until today. This structure needs to be enhancedto address new challenges of the 21st century. The NationalResearch Council observed in 2000 that the nation’s envi-ronmental problems “can only be addressed through anunderstanding of the complex interrelationships amongenvironmental media (air, water, land, and biota), humanhealth, ecology and economic sectors” (10).

Today many observers are arguing that it is imperative torevisit the goals of NEPA and the recommendations of theAsh Council to consider what further transformations ofscience and environmental management are required. Forexample, a distinguished group of environmental lawyershas argued, “The opportunity is now at hand to adoptfundamental reforms in outdated 1970s environmentalstatutes, not only to deal with new problems such as climatechange, but also to fix structural problems in the statutes toaddress many older problems that have gone unresolved”(11). Terry Davies, who was among senior EPA officialscharged with implementing the Ash memo, has recentlycalled for sweeping restructuring of federal environmentalresearch and management functions and creation of a newDepartment of Environmental and Consumer Protection (12).Also, several former federal officials have advocated a newEarth Systems Science Agency to address interrelated en-vironmental challenges on a global scale (13).

Tackling the new global and national environmental chal-lenges demands a new dialogue on science and the environ-ment, extending beyond EPA to all federal and state agencies.For example, EPA’s activities concerning water issues dependheavily on the work of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) andstate agencies; the success of endangered species protectionprograms relies upon collaboration among the Fish and WildlifeService, EPA, the states, and nonprofit organizations; and theeffectiveness of climate change programs depends on coopera-tion among EPA, the National Oceanic and AtmosphericAdministration (NOAA), and state agencies.

Within this collaborative space, there is opportunity forEPA’s science programs to go beyond media-specific needsand provide the interdisciplinary physical, biological, andsocial science analysis needed to address complex policyissues and define new strategies promoting a sustainableenvironment. EPA needs to be one of the leading federalagencies working to establish an integrated, comprehensivescience and management approach that can address thecomplex and urgent environmental problems of today andthe future. How can this be done?

Organizational and Systems ThinkingThe Ash Council wisely recognized the crucial role oforganizational and systems thinking in mobilizing “people,ideas, and things in ways best calculated to achieve clearly

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articulated goals.” One of us (Senge and colleagues) expresseda similar insight nearly 40 years later: “If we see eachproblemsbe it water shortages, climate change, or povertysasseparate, and approach each separately, the solutions wecome up with will be short-term, often opportunistic quickfixes that do nothing to address deeper imbalances” (14).

Traditional approaches to economic and environmentalmanagement are based on static, compartmentalized models.But the ecosystems and industrial systems that we try tomanage are themselves tightly coupled and dynamic systemswhich often operate far from equilibrium and exhibitnonlinear and sometimes chaotic behavior. To better un-derstand these phenomena, scientists have been pursuingresearch in the field of biocomplexity, which seeks tocharacterize interdependencies and feedback loops amongnetworks of human and biophysical systems. This researchinvestigates the flows of information, materials, energy,financial capital, and labor among economic systems (in-cluding resource extraction, agriculture, and industry),societal systems (including urban centers, education, com-munication, and human interactions), and natural systems(including atmospheric, aquatic, biological, and geological).

Biocomplex systems challenge naı̈ve notions of sustain-ability as steady-state equilibrium. Such systems requireunderstanding of economic, societal, and environmentalforces of change that can disrupt cycles of material and energyflows. Few people foresaw key connections that may havesignificant consequences: U.S. ethanol production based oncorn may drive up food prices in Mexico; Mississippi Riverfloods may lead to fuel shortages; global population growthmay exacerbate imbalances in the world’s nitrogen cycle.

Twenty-first century environmental protection will de-pend upon shared public understanding of the deep inter-dependence among global systems for the production anddistribution of food, energy, and industrial goods. Imple-menting this perspective should be a core function ofgovernment and educational institutions, encouraging thestudy of sustainable systems to prepare citizens for aglobalizing world.

Rather than treating environmental management as asubject for static optimization, we need to apply advancedmodeling and decision support approaches for dynamic,adaptive management (15). This means that federal agencieswill need to find new ways of collecting, analyzing, andcommunicating data and engaging diverse stakeholders.Alternative, market-based approaches to environmentalprotection, such as cap-and-trade systems, can only succeedwith scientific insights as to the underlying drivers ofenvironmental outcomes. In the long run, a balance betweeneconomic growth and environmental protection can only beachieved through advancing sustainable systems as a policyand management objective.

Sustainability Science and Technology in the 21stCenturyFrom the perspectives of global and U.S. science, policy, andregulation, the time has come to evaluate how agencies candeploy a more integrated approach to research and policy-making. For example, in response to growing trends in wastemanagement and toxic chemicals, the European Union (EU)has enacted several directives with important global envi-ronmental implications: Restriction of Hazardous Substances(RoHS), Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE),and Registration, Evaluation and Authorization of Chemicals(REACH), among others.

Rather than just managing wastes, these directives callfor managing material flows over product life cycles andapplying green engineering and green chemistry principlesto product manufacturing processes. Similarly, the 2007 U.S.

Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) mandates lifecycle analysis of greenhouse gas emissions for biofuelfeedstocks and recognizes the need for assessment of keyenvironmental variables to fully understand the impacts ofbiofuel production and use. Such initiatives must be widelyadopted to achieve a broad systems approach to dealingwithemergingandnewlyrecognizedenvironmentalproblems.

Responding to these new challenges is sustainabilityscience and technology (SS&T), an emerging field of studywith origins in social and natural sciences, as well asengineering. Drawing upon many perspectives, SS&T seeksto forge a multidisciplinary and systems approach towardenvironmental management and technological transforma-tion. As Charles Perrings has argued, “Although the develop-ment of discipline-based science has been the source ofalmost all scientific advances of the last century, it has alsolimited the capacity of science to address problems that spanmultiple disciplines” (16).

SS&T examines new questions, such as: Why aim merelyto treat toxic waste when we can limit its creation throughthe use of more benign materials, more holistically designedand better engineered processes, and the establishment ofa regulatory system favoring recycling and reuse?

SS&T also requires a deep understanding of humanbehavior and patterns of knowledge dissemination to informdecision-makers and the public. A recent study suggestedhow global attitudes could support sustainable development,concluding that “... sustainability science will play a criticalrole, at multiple scales and using multiple methodologies, asit works to identify and explain the key relationships betweensustainability values, attitudes, and behaviorssand to applythis knowledge in support of sustainable development” (17).To reshape our economic and social foundations so as toensure sustainable environmental protection in the 21stcentury, we need improved environmental measurement andaccounting as well as more effective public reporting.

Enriching Environmental Data, Communicating ResultsAlthough national economic accounts provide extensive dataon stocks and flows of natural and manufactured capital, theU.S. is currently lacking a parallel national accounting ofphysical information on the environment. Such data arecollected at national and regional levels but are oftenincomplete, incomparable, and uneven in quality. Theselimitations lead to inadequate support for environmentalindicators essential for assessing and understanding the stateof the environment and its changes over time. Without aneffective physical accounting system, a more sustainableenvironment will be difficult to realize (18).

Computer simulations and other tools can present data ininteractive decision-support environments that help to makethe data more meaningful for decision makers. For example:simulators were at the core of the EU’s approach to regulatingacid rain (19); new sets of climate simulators, such as theC-ROADS interactive climate model (20), are being used toprepare negotiating teams for the December 2009 UnitedNations Climate Change “Conference of the Parties 15” inCopenhagen. The simulators allow negotiators to test theirpropositions against the best understanding of reductions ingreenhouse gas emissions, deforestation, and land use; theyalso allow nonscientists to test the effects of national positionsand improve the accuracy of their own conceptual models.

A comprehensive system of environmental data gen-eration, management, communication, and continuouslearning is vital to addressing the challenge of managingcomplex environmental and economic systemssespeciallyin this age of turbulent change and uncertainty. Manydeveloped nations have established accounting systemsthat better track physical flows of raw materials, manu-

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factured goods, and other commodities. Without anapproach incorporating the perspectives of “industrialecology,” the U.S. will be seriously hampered in evaluatingsustainability strategies and in collaborating and compet-ing with other nations.

To promote public understanding of the ecologicalfootprint of product development and to better influencethe priorities of decision-makers, environmental data and

information must also be available and meaningful to thepublic. Citizens and consumers cannot be expected to delveinto the complexities of sustainability science, but policy-makers have an obligation to inform the public about therisks and trade-offs that are implicit in decision making.How to move beyond the oversimplification of indi-cator schemes such as “carbon labels” remains an openquestion.

TABLE 1. Two Centuries of Evolving U.S. Environmental Policy

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FIGURE 1. Timeline of environmental progress in the U.S.

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A Call to ActionTable 1, adapted from Allenby and Graedel (21), summarizesU.S. environmental policy in past centuries and how it mustevolve in the 21st century. This evolution will help meet thechallenge, voiced in 1989 by the House Committee on Science,of science helping society to make good decisions about theenvironment (22). Figure 1 summarizes some of the majorevents that have punctuated the transition from landconservation to pollution control to systems thinking.

To support this essential evolution in environmentalpolicy, EPA must continue to use science to fulfill its mandateto develop and enforce regulations that protect human healthand the environment. It must also use sustainability scienceto move beyond the current regulatory framework anddevelop and implement a more integrated, systems-based,and cross-media approach to address the challenges of thisnew century. This will require that the agency’s efforts beexpanded to collect, develop, synthesize, and disseminateintegrated scientific and technical information; to developmetrics for determining progress toward national sustain-ability goals; to develop cost-effective and innovative solu-tions consistent with smart economic growth; and to attracta new generation of exceptional minds by making the searchfor talent a strategic priority (23). Working with other agencies,businesses, and civil society organizations toward these ends,EPA will thus earn wide recognition as the nation’s proactiveenvironmental leader and facilitator.

As EPA approaches its 40th anniversary, the time is right forpublicdeliberationonthenext levelofenvironmentalprotectionand the role of sustainability science and technology in reachingsound environmental social and economic decisions.

Joseph Fiksel is Executive Director of the Center for Resilience at TheOhio State University and a research faculty member in the Departmentof Integrated Systems Engineering. Thomas Graedel is Clifton R. MusserProfessor of Industrial Ecology, Environmental Engineering, & Geology& Geophysics, at Yale University. He cochairs the National Academyof Sciences Roundtable on Science and Technology for Sustainability.Alan D. Hecht is Director for Sustainable Development in the Officeof Research and Development of the U.S. Environmental ProtectionAgency. David Rejeski directs the Foresight and Governance Projectat the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. He is amember of the EPA Science Advisory Board and the Advisory Committeeon Environmental Research and Education at the National ScienceFoundation. Gary S. Sayler is Beaman Distinguished Professor ofMicrobiology and Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the Universityof Tennessee-Knoxville, and Director of the UT-ORNL Joint Institutefor Biological Sciences at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. He iscurrently chairman of the EPA Board of Scientific Counselors (BOSC).Peter M. Senge is the founding chairperson of the Society forOrganizational Learning (SoL) and a senior lecturer at the Mas-sachusetts Institute of Technology. Deborah L. Swackhamer is theCharles Denny Chair of Science and Policy in the Humphrey Instituteof Public Affairs, Professor of Environmental Health Sciences, andCodirector of the Water Resources Center at the University of Minnesotain the Twin Cities. She currently serves as Chair of the U.S. EPA ScienceAdvisory Board. Thomas L. Theis is Director of the Institute forEnvironmental Science and Policy at the University of Illinois atChicago and professor of civil and materials engineering. He is amember of the U.S. EPA Science Advisory Board. Address cor-respondence about this article to Joseph Fiksel at fiksel.2@osu.edu.

AcknowledgmentsViews expressed in this article do not necessarily representofficial positions of EPA, its advisory committees, or the SeniorEnvironmental Employment (SEE) program. We gratefullyacknowledge Edward B. Fallon, Ph.D., a Social Science Analystin the SEE program (sponsored by the EPA and the NationalCaucus and Center on Black Aged, Inc.) for his work tostrengthen the analysis, structure, and language of thisViewpoint. We also acknowledge the assistance of TerryDavies in clarifying the history of EPA’s formation.

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