How costly is “clean”? An analysis of the benefits and costs of Superfund site remediations

Abstract

The cleanup of hazardous waste sites under the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Superfund program is governed by a number of legislative and regulatory constraints. Congress passed legislation in 1986 directing the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to pursue permanent remedies that embodied stringent cleanup standards. The agency has chosen to use conservative assumptions in risk assessments at hazardous waste sites, including a presumption that on‐site risks for hypothetical future residents should be calculated in the site remediation process. This article offers the first comprehensive assessment of the cost‐effectiveness of these Superfund cleanups. Our results reveal that many EPA Superfund remediations fail a partial benefit‐cost test. For a sample of the 150 Superfund sites, we find that at the majority of sites the expected number of cancers averted by remediation is less than 0.1 cases per site and that the cost per cancer case averted is over $100 million. The analysis demonstrates the importance of explicitly calculating the trade‐offs embodied in environmental cleanup decisions. © 1998 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management

The externality principle: Transfer‐seeking as an economic basis for regulatory takings

“…Many of these risks will be present only if there are hypothesized changes in land use in the future." 26 The Hamilton and Viscusi study concludes that about 70 percent of all chemical pathways from toxic waste sites are from projected future land uses as opposed to current land uses. Further, about 95 percent of all health risks are from future hypothetical risk scenarios based on unlikely human behavior (e.g., drinking well water over decades, ingesting or playing in soil for at least two-thirds of a year for five consecutive years, eating plant life from an exposed site).…”

Measuring eco-efficiency of contaminated soil management at the regional level

“…Several studies have adopted these indicators (see e.g. Wolka, 1997;Hamilton and Viscusi, 1999;European Commission, 2001;Jackson, 2001Jackson, , 2002Bond, 2001;UNCTAD, 2004;Steen, 2005), but the results are mainly region-specific. The European project known as EURODEMO also developed an eco-efficiency indicator, defined as the ratio of remediation cost to environmental impact, such as the amount of soil remediated (EURODEMO, 2007).…”

Can we buy time? Evaluation of the Swedish government’s grant to remediation of contaminated sites

“…Hamilton and Viscusi (1999a;1999b) have, for instance, shown that several remediation measures imply a cost per cancer case avoided exceeding USD 100 million.…”