Gasping for Breath : The Administrative Flaws of Federal Hazardous Air Pollution

Victor B. Flatt

Abstract:

This article explains the continuing problems with protecting human health under the current Federal Clean Air Act’s Hazardous Air Pollutant (HAP) program. In particular, the article focuses on the difficulties in protecting the public from residual health risks when maximum technological controls have been put into place on all sources. The article traces the causes of these problems to flaws in the statutory implementation and the enforcement regime concerning residual health risks.  

In seeking to resolve these lingering flaws in federal regulation, this article surveys twelve states that have stricter protections than the federal government for residual risk from air toxics, and analyzes these states’ success in reducing air toxin concentrations. Commonalities between the most successful states programs reveal potential solutions for improving regulation of hazardous air pollutants at the federal level.