United States
Environmental Protection
Agency
Science Advisory
Board
January 1995
EPA-SAB-EC-95-007
S EPA Beyond The Horizon:
Using Foresight To Protect
The Environmental Future
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Science Advisory Board
Environmental Futures Committee
January 1995
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"If we could first know where we are and
whither we are tending, we could better judge
what to do, and how to do it."
-Abraham Lincoln
The Science Advisory Board (SAB) is a Congressionally-mandated, independent group
of scientists, engineers, and other professionals who provide technical advice and
information to the Administrator and other officials of the Environmental Protec-
tion Agency (EPA). The value of SAB's advice is a function of its independence from the
Agency and the highly-qualified, balanced expertise it can apply to technical questions.
In most cases, the SAB assesses scientific or engineering issues related to environmental
problems of immediate concern to EPA. On occasion, however, past EPA Administrators and
the Congress have requested the SAB's formal opinion on matters related to EPA's future
operations, research needs, management priorities, and budgets. In such cases, the SAB has
provided advice with an explicitly future-oriented policy dimension.
For example, in September 1988 the SAB issued Future Risk: Research Strategies for the
1990s, which recommended ways to strengthen EPA's research capabilities and increase the
emphasis on long-term research. In September 1990 the SAB released Reducing Risk: Setting
Priorities and Strategies for Environmental Protection, which recommended that the Agency use
relative risk to shape a more integrated, prioritized approach to environmental protection.
This report, Beyond the Horizon: Using Foresight to Protect the Environmental Future, also
contains SAB findings and recommendations that have broad, future-oriented policy impli-
cations. The contents of this report reflect the findings and recommendations of the SAB,
and they are not necessarily the views of EPA or any other Federal agency.
Cover photograph courtesy of the National Aeronautics and
Space Administration (NASA)
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Beyond The Horizon:
Using Foresight To Protect
The Environmental Future
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Science Advisory Board
Environmental Futures Committee
January 1995
Printed on Recyc/ed Paper
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Letter to the Administrator
January 15, 1995
Ms. Carol Browner
Administrator
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Washington, DC 20460
Science Advisory Board
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Washington, DC 20460
Dear Ms. Browner:
The Science Advisory Board is pleased to present to you
our most recent report, Beyond the Horizon: Using Foresight
to Protect Our Environmental Future. Prepared by the
Environmental Futures Committee with the assistance
of several SAB standing committees, this report responds
to a request from you and Assistant Administrator David
Gardiner to advise the Agency on ways to prepare for
environmental problems that may emerge in the 21st
century.
In the past, EPA's response to environmental problems
has been driven by environmental deterioration,
widespread public concern, Federal law, or a combination
of the three. In virtually all cases, EPA has acted to reduce
environmental threats that were immediate or near-term.
The SAB believes, however, that there is value for
EPA, and for a prudent nation, in anticipating problems
that may emerge in the future, and, if necessary, taking
action in the present to reduce them or to avoid them
entirely. The benefits of foresight are economic (as the
costs of solving problems are reduced), environmental
(as environmental losses are avoided), and social (as
environmental debts are not passed on to future
generations). For these reasons, the SAB in this report
recommends that EPA, working with other appropriate
organizations both inside and outside the government,
develop a "futures" capability, a capability to anticipate
future environmental conditions and analyze the actions
needed to improve them.
The members of the Environmental Futures
Committee recognize that EPA often is criticized for
overreacting to immediate environmental problems, and
for imposing costs out of proportion to the environmental
risks involved. Such criticisms are likely to be directed at
any Agency effort to anticipate possible future problems,
or propose actions to address them before they emerge.
Nevertheless, such a futures capability is desirable. In
this report the SAB is not predicting that particular
environmental problems will emerge in the future, nor
are we suggesting the kinds or extent of the actions that
EPA should take in the near term to avoid them. Rather,
we strongly suggest that EPA should include, among its
repertoire of technical and analytical skills, a capability
to routinely and systematically study the range of possible
environmental futures ahead, and advise the nation on
possible actions in response.
All Americans-those of us alive today, and those of
us to come-would be well served by this attentiveness
to the future.
Sincerely, Dr. Raymond Loehr
Chair, Environmental Futures Committee
Dr. Genevieve Matanoski
Chair, Science Advisory Board
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Contents
Executive Summary
1. Why Think About the Future? 1
2. The Environmental Futures Committee 3
3. A System of Inquiry 3
4. Beyond the Horizon 5
5. The Recommendations 5
Findings on Environmental Futures
1. The Forces of Change 7
2. Current Uses of Foresight 9
3. Foresight Methodologies 11
4. The Value-and Uncertainty-of Foresight 12
5. Possible Emerging Problem Areas 13
6. The Environment: A Strategic
National Interest 17
7. Thinking of Futures at EPA 18
Recommendations On Environmental Futures
Recommendation 1 21
Recommendation 2 22
Recommendation 3 22
Recommendation 4 25
Recommendation 5 29
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Science Advisory Board
Environmental Futures Committee
Chair
Dr. Raymond Loehr
H. M. Alharthy Centennial Chair and Professor
Environmental and Water Resources Program
The University of Texas at Austin
Austin, TX
Members1
Mr. Alvin Aim
Sector Vice President
Science Applications International
Corporation
McLean, VA
Mr. Richard Conway
Senior Corporate Fellow
Union Carbide Corporation
South Charleston, WV
(Liaison to the Environmental
Engineering Committee)
Dr. Paul Deisler
(Retired)
Austin, TX
Dr. Kenneth Dickson
Director, Institute of Applied
Science
University of North Texas
Denton, TX
(Liaison to the Ecological Processes
and Effects Committee)
Mr. Theodore J. Gordon
(Retired)
Vero Beach, FL
Mr. Fred Hansen2
Director, Oregon Department
of Environmental Quality
Portland, OR
Dr. Morton Lippmann
Institute for Environmental
Medicine
New York University
Tuxedo, NY
(Liaison to the Indoor Air Quality
and Total Human Exposure
Committee)
Dr. Genevieve M. Matanoski
Department of Epidemiology
School of Public Health
The Johns Hopkins University
Baltimore, MD
(Executive Committee Chair and
Liaison to the Radiation
Advisory Committee)
' The Committee also was assisted by Ms. Linda Greer, Natural Resources Defense
Council (Washington, DC).
Mr. Hansen served on the Environmental Futures Committee from December 1993
until September 1994, when he resigned to become the Deputy Administrator of EPA.
Dr. Paulette Middleton
Science & Policy Associates, Inc.
Boulder, CO
(Liaison to the Clean Air
Scientific Advisory Committee)
Dr. Verne Ray
Medical Research Laboratory
Pfizer Inc.
Groton, CT
(Liaison to the Drinking Water
Committee)
Dr. Terry Yosie
Vice President
E. Bruce Harrison Company
Washington, DC
Designated
Federal Officals
Dr. Edward S. Bender
Mr. A. Robert Flaak
Staff Secretaries
Ms. Diana L. Pozun
Ms. Lori Anne Gross
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1. Why Think About the
Future?
Executive Summary
For the past quarter century, the basic
approach to environmental protection in
this country has been, for the most part,
reactive. Institutions have been estab-
lished, laws passed, and regulations writ-
ten in response to problems that already
were posing substantial ecological and
public health risks and costs, or that al-
ready were causing deep-seated public
concern.
Since its inception, the Environ-
mental Protection Agency (EPA)-like
the nation-has focused its environmen-
tal attention almost exclusively on the
present and the past. The political will
to establish the Agency grew out of a se-
ries of highly-publicized, well-advanced
environmental problems, like the fire on
the Cuyahoga River, smog in Los Ange-
les, and the near-extinction of the bald
eagle. During the 1970s and 1980s, the
U.S. Congress enacted a series of laws in-
tended to solve serious existing environ-
mental problems, and EPA was given the
responsibility to administer most of them.
The Superfund program, by definition,
was intended to clean up the environ-
mental mistakes of the past. Even those
EPA activities like pollution prevention
programs and new source performance
standards, that are intended explicitly to
avoid future problems, are given impetus
by problems that already exist.
Despite the nation's demonstrable
success in ameliorating a number of ex-
isting environmental problems, an almost
exclusive reliance on after-the-fact re-
sponse (i.e., not responding to environ-
mental problems until they pose imme-
diate and unambiguous risks) will not pro-
tect the environment adequately in the
future. It is essential for EPA-and for
other agencies and organizations whose
activities affect the environment-to be-
gin to anticipate future environmental
problems, and then take steps to avoid
them, not just respond to them after the
fact. Indeed, one of the most important
lessons taught by this country's environ-
mental history is that the failure to think
about the future environmental conse-
quences of prospective social, economic,
and technological changes (i.e., the fail-
ure to engage in environmental foresight)
may impose substantial-and avoid-
able-economic and environmental costs
on future generations.
Thinking about the future is more
important today than ever before, be-
cause ever-faster change is shrinking
the distance between the present and
the future. Technological capabilities-
in computers, for example-thai
seemed beyond the horizon just a few
years ago are now out-dated. Scientific
understanding and the flow of informa-
tion are accelerating. Similarly, the en-
vironmental effects of global economic
activity are being felt more rapidly by
both nations and individuals.
As a result, traditional responses
to environmental problems, i.e., the
actions taken by government or the pri-
vate sector to solve problems after they
emerge, will not be effective enough,
or take effect quickly enough, to pro-
tect vital economic and environmen-
tal resources. If, for example, natural
habitats such as temperate forests dete-
riorated quickly and extensively, it
probably would be too late to save many
indigenous species by the time popula-
tion declines were noticed. In short, the
increased pace of economic and tech-
nological change dictates an increased
emphasis on foresight to protect the en-
vironment over the long term.
Thinking about the future is valu-
able because, by initiating thought and
analysis well in advance of anticipated
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change, it can shorten the time needed
and improve the quality of the response
to such change, were it to occur, and
reduce-or avoid entirely-the losses
that result when pollution problems
persist over time. Because such losses
may be irreversible, response time may
well be a critical measure of society's
ability to protect environmental qual-
ity in the future.
The bald eagle has soared back
from the edge of extinction, but the loss
of that species very nearly became irre-
versible because of inattention to the
possible side effects of some pesticides.
Even when losses are potentially revers-
ible, like the respiratory effects that re-
sult from short-term human exposure to
ground-level ozone, high costs may be
imposed on human health or the
economy before ozone exposures are
reduced.
Thinking about the future also is
valuable because the cost of avoiding a
problem is often far less than the cost
of solving it later. The national experi-
ence with hazardous waste disposal pro-
vides a compelling example. Some pri-
vate companies and Federal facilities
undoubtedly saved money in the short
term by disposing of hazardous wastes
inadequately, but those savings were
dwarfed by the cost of cleaning up haz-
ardous waste sites years later. In that
case, foresight could have saved private
industry, insurance companies, and the
Federal government (i.e., taxpayers)
billions of dollars, while reducing the
pollutant exposures-and resulting
anxieties-in neighboring communi-
ties.
Besides reducing both the response
time and the cost of protective actions,
thinking about the future also can help
preserve a wider variety of response op-
tions. For example, there are several
ways to limit the potential future effects
of solid waste disposal on groundwater,
e.g., improving disposal facilities, sepa-
rating wastes before disposal, prevent-
ing waste generation, and recycling.
There are fewer-and more expen-
sive-alternatives for cleaning up
groundwater after contamination. En-
vironmental foresight preserves flexibil-
ity for the future.
Thinking about the future has an-
other value, one that goes beyond the
immediate costs and benefits of envi-
ronmental protection. Actions driven
by environmental foresight can help
strengthen intergenerational equity by
preserving the environmental inherit-
ance of future generations. When one
generation's behavior necessitates en-
vironmental remediation in the future,
a burden of environmental debt is be-
queathed to its children just as surely
as unbalanced government budgets he-
queath a burden of future financial
debt. By anticipating the emergence of
environmental problems, and by taking
steps now to prevent them, the present
generation can minimize the environ-
mental and financial debts that future
generations will incur.
Finally, thinking about the future
is valuable because it allows people to
shape the world in which they live. The
future undoubtedly will be different
from the present; change is inexorable.
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But humanity is not powerless in the
face of change. The kinds of change that
will occur, and their effects on the en-
vironment, are not inevitable and im-
mutable. The future can be
changed-and improved-thro ugh
commitment and action in the present.
In summary, environmental fore-
sight can help identify potential issues
and options for action that, if taken to-
day, would help protect the environment
from the adverse effects of future change.
By thinking of the future, by engaging in
environmental foresight, the American
people can better understand the full
range of risks and opportunities-envi-
ronmental and economic-possible in the
future, and then better define the actions
needed today to reduce the risks and pre-
serve the opportunities.
2. The Environmental Futures
Committee
In July 1993, EPA Administrator Carol
Browner and David Gardiner, the EPA
Assistant Administrator for the Office
of Policy, Planning, and Evaluation
(OPPE), asked the Science Advisory
Board (SAB) to investigate environ-
mental futures. They solicited the
SAB's advice on the value of anticipat-
ing environmental problems that might
emerge in the future, the tools that
might be used to anticipate them, and
examples of possible emerging ecologi-
cal and human health problems. In
other words, EPA asked the SAB to
apply its scientific expertise, look be-
yond the horizon, and then advise the
Agency on the use of foresight as a tool
for protecting the environment for fu-
ture generations.
In response to EPA's request, the
SAB formed the Environmental Futures
Committee (EFC) to undertake a study
of environmental foresight. (The mem-
bers of the EFC are listed at the front of
this report.) The EFC's major objectives
were to:
• Assess different methodologies cur-
rently being used to study possible fu-
tures and anticipate likely future
events;
• Identify some environmental issues
that could emerge over the long term
(through the year 2025); and
• Advise EPA on ways to incorporate
futures research into the Agency's ac-
tivities.
This report, Beyond the Horizon:
Using Foresight to Protect the Environ-
mental Future, summarizes the results of
the EFC's study.
To support its investigation into
environmental futures, the EFC held
more than a dozen public meetings and
six fact-finding sessions with various or-
ganizations inside and outside the Fed-
eral government. The individuals and
organizations that provided informa-
tion for this report are listed in Appen-
dix I of the technical annex.
In addition, five of the SAB's
standing committees prepared full re-
ports that include conclusions and rec-
ommendations related to possible future
environmental issues in their areas of
special expertise. These reports, which
contain more detailed information than
this summary report, are available to
the public. Information on how to ob-
tain them, together with a short de-
scription of each standing committee's
conclusions and recommendations, can
be found at the back of this report.
3. A System of Inquiry
To meet the objectives of this study, the
EFC first outlined a formal system of in-
quiry capable of anticipating possible
environmental issues that could emerge
over the next five to 30 years. Then it
tested that system in order to define
specific issues that could emerge. Thus,
the EFC not only delineated the vari-
ous methodologies currently available
to futures research, but it tested one of
them. Both elements-the generic
analysis and the specific application-
contributed to the conclusions and rec-
ommendations in this report.
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"...looking beyond the horizon
is essential to the nation's
future success in protecting
the environment."
From the outset, the EFC recog-
nized that it was not possible to antici-
pate future environmental problems
without attempting to identify the large
social, economic, and technological
forces that were likely to drive future
changes in environmental conditions.
Such drivers (e.g., population growth,
economic expansion) can generate en-
vironmental stressors (e.g., habitat al-
teration, global climate change) that
cause adverse effects on specific human
health and ecological endpoints (loss of
particular species, lung cancer in hu-
mans). Figure 1 presents a conceptual
model of the relationship between driv-
ers, stressors, and endpoints.
Because understanding the drivers
of change is critical to understanding
change itself, the EFC attempted to
identify possible drivers of environmen-
tal change in the future. Although there
are many such drivers, the EFC identi-
fied four as especially important: popu-
lation growth and urbanization, eco-
nomic expansion and resource con-
sumption, technological development,
and environmental attitudes and insti-
tutions. These drivers are discussed in
more detail in Section 4 of the techni-
cal annex to this report.
The EFC also reviewed method-
ologies currently available for anticipat-
ing environmental issues that could
emerge in the future. A detailed sum-
mary of these methodologies is pre-
sented in Section 3 of the technical
annex.
Finally, by applying one of the
foresight methodologies, the EFC com-
piled an initial list of possible future en-
vironmental issues. A more detailed dis-
cussion of these issues is contained in
Section 5 of the technical annex.
Figure 1. Conceptual Model of Drivers, Stressors, and Endpoints
Ecosystems
arid/or
Humans at Risk
Risk
Management
Alternatives
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4. Beyond the Horizon
The process of assessing and applying the
formal system of inquiry called futures re-
search led the EFC to the major conclu-
sions of this report: EPA, and other agen-
cies and organizations whose activities
affect the environment, should give as
much attention to avoiding future envi-
ronmental problems as to controlling
current ones. In particular, EPA should
establish a strong environmental futures
capability that serves as an early-warn-
ing system for emerging environmental
problems.
Because EPA is responsible for pro-
tecting the environment now and over
the long term, the Agency has an obliga-
tion to search for the "weak signals" that
portend future risk to human health and
to ecosystems, and that provide early
clues about how to ameliorate or avoid
those problems entirely. EPA's futures re-
search should be global in scope, eclectic
in its use of information sources, and
quantitative whenever possible. It should
be continuous, interactive with other or-
ganizations, and subject to scrutiny from
outside the Agency. It should be linked
to the futures research of other agencies
and organizations, and its results should
be shared openly with the public.
EPA's traditional methods of iden-
tify ing-and solving-environmental
problems will not be adequate to pro-
tect against problems that may emerge
several years-or decades-from now.
They were not designed to determine
the costs of future environmental prob-
lems or the benefits of actions taken
today to avoid them, both of which are
difficult to estimate accurately. Futures
research has to be extraordinarily tol-
erant of omissions, uncertainties, inac-
curacies, and errors, because any view
beyond the horizon is inevitably dim.
Yet looking beyond the horizon is
essential to the nation's future success in
protecting the environment. Protecting
the future with foresight is a critical part
of EPA's responsibility, and it is a forward-
looking extension of the pollution pre-
vention concept.
EPA alone is not responsible for
looking beyond the horizon in order to
protect future environmental quality.
Many other organizations, both inside
and outside of government, have substan-
tial roles to play. Thus, this summary re-
port contains detailed recommendations
intended to help EPA, other Federal
agencies, the private sector, and the na-
tion clarify their view of, and better pro-
tect, the environment of the future.
5. The Recommendations
As society plans for the future, it is
legitimate and appropriate for EPA to
take responsibility for anticipating
and attempting to mitigate future en-
vironmental problems, particularly
those that may be only "dots on the
horizon" now, but whose potential
effects in the future may be large. An
anticipatory role is especially appro-
priate, given the fact that some fu-
ture environmental problems will be
different, and possibly more far-
reaching, than environmental prob-
lems in the past.
EPA cannot undertake this effort
by itself. The involvement of many
other agencies and organizations, as
well as the private sector and the gen-
eral public-all of whose activities af-
fect environmental quality-is essen-
tial to the success of this forward-
looking, evaluative, and ultimately
pollution-preventing effort.
This report does not predict or
even suggest that environmental ca-
lamities are inevitable in the future.
Rather, through the investigation of
future possibilities, this report em-
phasizes the value of anticipating, un-
derstanding, and-if necessary-re-
sponding to environmental problems
before they emerge in the future,
rather than continuing to play
"catch-up" with problems after they
emerge. The following recommenda-
tions are intended to strengthen the
nation's ability to protect the future
using the tools of foresight.
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Summary of Recommendations
1. As much attention should be given
to avoiding future environmental
problems as to controlling current
ones.
EPA should incorporate futures re-
search and analysis into all of its
programs and activities, particularly
strategic planning and budgeting,
and then be prepared to act-in
conjunction with other public and
private-sector organizations-on
the basis of that information.
2. As an essential part of its futures
capabilities, EPA should establish
an early-warning system to iden-
tify potential future environmen-
tal risks.
Working with other agencies and
organizations as appropriate, EPA
should establish a look-out panel-
made up of individuals from inside
and outside government-to pro-
vide the Agency, and the nation,
with an early warning of environ-
mental issues that may emerge in
the future.
3. In a longer-term, more comprehen-
sive effort, EPA should evaluate
five overarching problem areas re-
lated to a number of potential fu-
ture environmental issues.
As EPA strengthens its futures ca-
pabilities, it should pay particular-
and ongoing-attention to five ma-
jor problem areas:
• Sustainability of terrestrial eco-
systems;
• Non-cancer human health ef-
fects;
• Total air pollutant loadings;
• Non-traditional environmental
stressors; and
• Health of the oceans.
4. EPA should stimulate coordinated
national efforts to anticipate and
respond to environmental change.
Because an integrated, national ef-
fort is essential to environmental
protection, EPA should spur coop-
erative activities among Federal
agencies, different levels of govern-
ment, and the private sector in four
key areas:
• Improving and integrating envi-
ronment-related futures studies;
• Focusing attention on the broad
causes of environmental change,
not just the end results;
• Improving environmental aware-
ness and education; and
• Establishing a broad-based data
system for anticipating future en-
vironmental risks.
5. EPA, as well as other agencies and
organizations, should recognize
that global environmental quality
is a matter of strategic national
interest.
Recognizing that the United States
is part of a global ecosystem that is
affected by the actions of all coun-
tries, EPA should begin working
with relevant agencies and organi-
zations to develop strategic national
policies that link national security,
foreign relatrons, environmental
quality, and economic growth.
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1. The Forces of Change
Findings on
Environmental
Futures
Large social, economic, technological,
and institutional forces will cause fu-
ture environmental risks that are po-
tentially greater than those currently
recognized and managed.
Any attempt to anticipate future
change must begin with the forces that
drive such change. These forces-so-
called "drivers"-suggest how change
will manifest itself in the future, and
how the environmental effects of such
change can be altered by action in the
present.
Environmental foresight requires
an understanding of the large social,
economic, technological, and institu-
tional forces that contain the seeds of
future environmental problems. Al-
though many forces-seen and unfore-
seen-no doubt will affect future envi-
ronmental quality, four of the most
likely-and important-are: 1) the in-
crease and rapid urbanization of global
populations; 2) economic expansion
and related energy use and natural re-
source consumption; 3) technological
advances; and 4) the environmental at-
titudes and institutions that reflect and
condition the responses of people ev-
erywhere to environmental change.
These drivers are interdependent,
and the changes they drive could have
both positive and negative effects on
the environment. Population growth
and higher per capita income, for ex-
ample, most likely will drive increased
demands for energy, natural resources,
and manufactured goods. At the same
time, higher per capita income, com-
bined with improved education and an
expanded range of personal choices,
could reduce population pressures,
while cleaner fuels and higher end-use
efficiencies could reduce the local and
global environmental effects of in-
creased energy use. Technological
changes could either exacerbate or ame-
liorate environmental pressures.
Clearly, the drivers of future
change are not static, passive forces.
They are the consequences of personal,
community, and national choices. Thus
the drivers of change are themselves
subject to change, and, viewed sepa-
rately, they suggest the range, signifi-
cance, and complexity of the forces that
will affect environmental quality in the
future.
Population Growth and Urbanization
The continuing growth in human popu-
lation, and the concentration of growing
populations in large urban areas, will pose
enormous environmental challenges in
the future. The United Nations projects
that the global population will increase
from 5.6 billion currently to between 7.9
and 12 billion by the year 2050. (See Fig-
ure 2.) Urban areas will grow even faster,
thus increasing the number of megacities
with populations numbering from 10 to
20 million or more. As populations be-
come more concentrated, environmental
problems will intensify. Providing safe
drinking water, wastewater and solid
waste disposal systems, as well as envi-
ronmentally-sustainable transportation
systems will pose a daunting challenge in
urban areas worldwide, including in some
parts of the United States. Failure to pro-
vide for those needs will contribute to
new or exacerbated environmental prob-
lems that could have regional or interna-
tional social, economic, and political
ramifications.
Economic Expansion and Resource
Consumption
Over the next 20 years, per capita in-
come in many developing countries is
likely to increase. Currently, Latin
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America and the Asian Pacific Rim
economies are experiencing rapid eco-
nomic growth, and substantial growth
also is likely in other Asian nations and
Central and Eastern Europe. This de-
velopment, coupled with population
growth, will result in greater consump-
tion of energy, natural resources, and
consumer goods.
Although recent U.S. and Western
European experience indicates that en-
ergy use does not necessarily grow in di-
rect proportion to economic growth,
there is little doubt that energy use will
rise dramatically in the developing world
over the next 20 to 30 years. According
to Department of Energy projections,
energy demand in developing nations is
likely to reach 240 quadrillion BTUs
(quads) by the year 2010, an increase of
over 40 percent in 20 years. During the
same period, U.S. energy demand is pro-
jected to reach 105 quads, a 26 percent
increase. By 2010, developing nations
could account for more than half of the
world's total energy demand. This level
of growth is likely, even if per capita en-
ergy consumption in developing countries
remains at much lower levels than in the
industrialized world.
The fuels used to provide energy
could have a profound impact on the
environment. If countries such as
China and India choose to generate
electricity with conventional coal tech-
nologies and minimum pollution con-
Figure 2. Population Growth, 1750-2100
Actual
Projected
r
High
Growth
Medium
Growth
Low
Growth
2000 2050 2100
Source: United Nations
trols, the local, regional, and global
environmental impacts could be sub-
stantial. On the other hand, alternative
fuels and higher energy efficiency could
help reduce those effects.
The potentially devastating effects
of population growth, economic expan-
sion, and individual behavior on natural
resources already are evident in many
parts of the world. All major ocean fish-
ing areas presently are being fished at or
beyond capacity, according to the United
Nations, and global per capita seafood
supplies have declined by nine percent
within the past five years. (See Figure 3.)
Approximately 5-10 percent of the
world's living reefs-the rainforests of the
oceans-have died because of economic
activity along coastlines and in coastal
waters. Continuation of trends like these,
especially in light of expected population
growth, would have adverse environmen-
tal and economic consequences for people
everywhere.
Technological Development
Throughout history, technological
change has been one of the most im-
portant factors driving economic and
environmental change. Technology is
likely to play an even greater role in the
future, as technological development
proceeds at a faster pace and has a more
pervasive impact on societies and indi-
viduals.
-------
In the past, the adverse environ-
mental effects of growing populations
and expanding economies have been
ameliorated by the development of new
technologies-centralized waste water
treatment systems, for example. Tech-
nological advances in the future (e.g.,
cleaner fuels, more energy-efficient
transportation and power distribution
systems, less wasteful manufacturing
processes) are likely to yield similar en-
vironmental benefits.
At the same time, new products
(e.g., alternative transportation fuels) and
materials (e.g., in photovoltaic cells or
next-generation batteries) may result in
new exposures and pose potential new
risks to human health and ecosystems. In
this sense, the future will be much like
the past: technological change will bring
with it both environmental improve-
ments and environmental problems.
One of the central challenges fac-
ing society today is anticipating the
likely environmental effects of future
technological development, and in-
cluding a concern for environmental
quality in the design of future technolo-
gies and products. New technologies-
in transportation, communications,
health care, and manufacturing-un-
doubtedly will change the world of the
future; many of those changes will have
environmental benefits. But neither
society nor industry can afford to wait
until then to begin addressing the en-
vironmental problems those technolo-
gies may bring with them.
Environmental Attitudes and Institutions
In the long run, environmental quality is
not determined solely by the actions of
governments, regulated industries, or
non-government organizations. It is
largely a function of the decisions and be-
havior of individuals, families, businesses,
and communities everywhere. Conse-
quently, the extent of environmental
awareness and the strength of environ-
mental institutions will be two critical
factors driving changes in environmen-
tal quality in the future.
A concerned, educated public, acting
through responsive local, national, and in-
ternational institutions, will
serve as effective agents for
avoiding future environmental
problems, no matter what they
are. Environmental institu-
tions, strengthened by in-
formed public support, will play
a critical role in devising and
implementing effective na-
tional and international re-
sponses to emerging issues.
There are several
promising ways to shape en-
vironmental attitudes and
institutions, and thus help
protect the environmental
future. These include em-
powering women worldwide
to reduce population growth, educating
consumers on the benefits of purchas-
ing environmentally-preferable prod-
ucts, and strengthening the ability of
non-government organizations to pro-
vide technical assistance, training, and
other services to support public health
and ecosystem protection in developed
and developing nations.
2. Current Uses of Foresight
Foresight-or futures research and
analysis-already is being used by gov-
ernment, private business, and non-
government organizations to anticipate
future change.
Figure 3. World Fish Catch Per Person,
1950-92
25
20
co 15
CO
2 10
5
0
1950
Year
1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
Source: FAO, Yearbook of Fishery Statistics:
Catches and Landings (Rome: various years)
-------
Some government agencies, pri-
vate businesses, and non-government
organizations already use foresight-or
futures research and analysis, as it is
sometimes called-in planning, goal-
setting, and policy-shaping. Although
different organizations use foresight for
different purposes, in all cases the par-
ticipation of management in the fore-
sight process has been essential to its
success.
While most futures studies focus on
the nearer term (less than five years),
some reach considerably further into the
future. For example, within the Federal
government, several agencies use quan-
titative forecasting techniques that em-
ploy statistical models to project long-
term future conditions. The Energy In-
formation Administration within the De-
partment of Energy develops detailed en-
ergy use projections as far as 20 years into
the future. With a shorter-term focus, the
Internal Revenue Service, the Depart-
ment of Defense, and the intelligence
community employ scanning systems and
trend analysis as part of institutional plan-
ning. The Department of Defense uses
"gaming" exercises to anticipate the pos-
sible circumstances of future warfare and
prepare a range of options in response.
Over the past several years, many
regional, state, and local governments
have applied the tools of foresight to as-
sess issues associated with demographics,
economic development, global climate
change, education, criminal justice, and
agriculture. To date, 30 states have estab-
lished State Futures Commissions to help
set long-term goals, strategies, and action
agendas for the states.
A number of foresight activities
have been supported by the governments
of other countries and by international
organizations (e.g., the Organization for
Economic Cooperation and Develop-
ment, the World Bank). The Dutch gov-
ernment, in particular, has been a lead-
ing advocate for national-level foresight
and long-range planning. Five Dutch
ministries currently are sponsoring a re-
search program to identify new technolo-
gies or technical systems that will support
economic growth and environmental
quality 50 years in the future.
In the private sector, foresight gen-
erally is used in relatively short-term busi-
ness planning in several ways: to antici-
pate changing circumstances that can af-
fect markets or competitive forces; to
forecast the size of current and potential
markets under varying assumptions about
price and competition; to select a set of
corporate financial and other goals; and
to elicit and test corporate strategy and
potential actions. The techniques used in
the private sector include demographic
and geographic analyses, statistical con-
sumer polling, formalized environmental
scanning, scenario construction, expert
panels, and econometrics and other forms
of computer modeling.
Examples of corporations that use
such techniques can be found in essen-
tially all industries, including communi-
cations, electronics, transportation, fi-
nance, energy, publishing, insurance, ag-
riculture, manufacturing, pharmaceuti-
cals, health care, and biotechnology.
Underlying these corporate activities is
the central assumption that opportuni-
ties can be discovered and problems
avoided by thinking about what lies
ahead.
EPA has relatively little institu-
tional experience with futures research.
A small Futures Office has been estab-
lished to identify and test environmen-
tal foresight tools, and futures research is
beginning to shape policy decisions in
some program offices. For example, EPA
has been working with other government
agencies to anticipate and respond to the
possibility of global climate change, since
measurements of carbon dioxide buildup
in the atmosphere have provided an early
warning of possible global warming. In
order to avoid potential environmental
problems in the future, the Agency has
begun working with other Federal and
state agencies to encourage energy con-
servation and thus reduce or limit carbon
dioxide emissions. (See Figure 4.)
-------
3. Foresight Methodologies
Futures research and analysis can be
systematically organized as an early-
warning system to identify-and then
help prevent-future environmental
problems.
In general, there are three basic
techniques widely used to identify pos-
sible future conditions. One is a top-
down approach; it involves the use of
"scenarios" that postulate certain cir-
cumstances about the future and then
draw some likely implications from
those circumstances. The second is a
bottom-up approach; it draws future im-
plications from early warning signals,
which are based either on the extrapo-
lation of current data and trends, or on
the observations of knowledgeable in-
dividuals-so-called "look-out panels."
The third is scanning, which involves a
continual, planned, deliberate, and
thorough review of selected published
information, and contacts with other
"futures watching" organizations.
All three approaches individu-
ally-and particularly in combina-
tion-can provide valuable insights
into the possible emergence of environ-
mental problems in the future. (Figure
5 shows the major features of an envi-
ronmental foresight process.)
In the first case, the top-down ap-
proach, scenarios are constructed to
study the environmental implications
of assumed future developments in
"drivers" like energy use, population
growth and density, technological ad-
vances, waste generation, and demand
for natural resources like potable wa-
ter. These images of possible futures can
be studied systematically to estimate
when and where environmental prob-
lems could emerge, and to assess differ-
ent types of policies that could be used
to obviate them.
Within a given scenario, assump-
tions concerning the future can be var-
ied to reflect different rates of change
(e.g., in energy use, population growth).
Postulated conditions about the future
also can be changed to reflect a future that
is possible (exploratory scenarios), or a
future that is desirable (normative sce-
narios). As long as these scenarios dis-
play changes in important variables over
time within a consistent analytical frame-
work, they can be useful tools for antici-
pating environmental problems in the
future, and analyzing the range of possible
responses to them.
In the second case, the bottom-up
approach, a specialized "look-out panel"
can provide perceptions, observations,
and information about important envi-
ronmental changes on--or just beyond-
the horizon. Look-out panels, which can
include laboratory scientists, professional
Figure 4. Carbon Emissions from Fossil Fuels, 1950-2010
10
o
co
O
m
/• 3% Annual Growth
'' ,j 2% Annual Growth
'/ \ _ _ i- - - -j 1 % Annual Growth
WorldWatch Goal
0
1950
Year
1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010
Source: Oak Ridge National Laboratory; WorldWatch
-------
field data collectors, or neighborhood vol-
unteers, function continuously. Through
systematic questioning and feedback,
panelists can provide observations about
the environment that can serve as early
warnings of environmental changes, and
they can assess the implications of these
changes to human health and ecosystem
viability.
In the third case, information re-
lated to emerging environmental prob-
lems can be gleaned from scholarly jour-
nals, newspapers, newsletters, business
plans, and science-oriented computer bul-
letin boards. Such sources of information,
which can be found in the United States
and abroad, include literature and aca-
demic disciplines well beyond the bounds
of traditional environmental science.
Scanning also can be part of the foresight
activities of look-out panels.
All three approaches are indepen-
dently useful in identifying the first weak
signals-the dots on the horizon-that
warn of emerging environmental prob-
lems. In addition, the techniques rein-
force one another by providing early
warnings from different perspectives.
Scenario analyses tend to raise top-down
issues generated by the assumptions used
in the scenarios (e.g., CO2 buildup as a
result of the energy strategies of large
countries like China and India). The
look-out panels call attention to specific
Figure 5. An Environmental Foresight Process
Task 2
Look-Out Panel:
Bottom Up
emerging issues (e.g., the introduction of
new toxic chemicals). Scanning cuts
across both approaches.
All three techniques can help iden-
tify potential environmental issues that
could be subjected to in-depth risk analy-
sis. All three, if used continuously and
interactively, could serve as a first line of
defense in protecting future environmen-
tal quality.
4. The Value-and
Uncertainty-of Foresight
The value of futures research and analy-
sis lies not in making predictions, but in
analyzing and organizing information that
can help shape decisions and actions.
Futures research and analysis will
not result in a complete or accurate pic-
ture of the future. The future, after all, is
dependent upon personal and institu-
tional decisions, chance, and natural pro-
cesses, all of which interact in an uncer-
tain and sometimes chaotic fashion, the
results of which are impossible to predict
with accuracy.
Because of its analytical processes
and organizing principles, however, fu-
tures research can enlighten contempo-
rary understanding of future possibilities
and options. Foresight need not be en-
tirely accurate or complete to be of value
to decisionmakers or to society as a whole.
The intellectual rigor necessitated by fu-
tures research is valuable in and of itself.
-------
The methodological processes of foresight
force new ways of thinking and new ways
of looking at old realities. They demand
comprehensiveness, a receptivity to un-
usual ideas, and the ability to reconfigure
old data from new perspectives. They help
set an agenda for discussion and debate
within organizations, and they provide a
more cohesive basis for planning that can
extend across organizations. Because they
stretch the bounds of thought, they help
decisionmakers discern new paths to or-
ganizational goals that may themselves be
changing. In short, the processes of fu-
tures research can help people explore,
understand, prepare for, and shape the
future while it is still beyond the hori-
zon, despite the uncertainties inherent in
such a distant view.
mittees of the SAB and individual
members were asked to use their spe-
cific knowledge and expertise to iden-
tify potential issues that, given exist-
ing "drivers" and data trends, could
emerge within the next 5-30 years.
The EFC then compiled and consoli-
dated the information into a list of
50 specific possible issues. (This list
is presented on pages 14 and 15.)
After compiling the list, the EFC
applied six criteria that it considers use-
ful in selecting issues that should be
analyzed further. (A short description
of these six criteria is included in the
box below.) Based on the results of its
selection process and the inherent simi-
larities among some potential issues, the
EFC consolidated them under five
large, overarching problem areas:
sustainability of terrestrial ecosystems;
non-cancer human health effects; total
air pollutant loadings; non-traditional
environmental stressors; and health of
the oceans.
All of these broad problem areas
are affected by the major drivers of
change discussed earlier in this report.
Because they encompass a number of
specific environmental issues, they
merit more detailed study.
Sustainability of Terrestrial Ecosystems
In the future, the health of biosystems
and the sustainable use of natural re-
sources will be stressed by a growing
human population, expanding energy
use, natural resource consumption, and
5. Possible Emerging Problem
Areas
Because of large-scale social, eco-
nomic, technological, and institutional
changes already underway, future en-
vironmental issues may emerge in at
least five different problem areas.
In preparing this report, the EFC
applied one of the issue-identifica-
tion methodologies (i.e., the bottom-
up, look-out panel approach) to test
the methodology and, in the process,
compile a list of possible future envi-
ronmental issues. The standing com-
Six Major Issue-Selection Criteria
Timing: How soon is this problem likely to emerge, how important is
early recognition, and how rapidly can the problem be re-
versed?
Novelty: To what extent is this a new problem that has not been ad-
dressed adequately?
Scope: How extensive-in terms of geography or population af-
fected, for example-is this problem?
Severity: How intensive are the likely health, ecological, economic,
and other impacts of this problem, and are they reversible?
Visibility: How much public concern is this problem likely to arouse?
Probability: What is the likelihood of this problem emerging, and neces-
sitating a response, in the future?
-------
Potential Future Environmental Issues
Identified by the EFC Look-Out Panel
The following summary statements of the 50 potential fu-
ture environmental issues describe each issue as if it were,
in fact, to emerge. However, the EFC is not predicting that
these issues actually will emerge, nor does the EFC be-
lieve this list is comprehensive. A different group of people
might well produce a somewhat different list. This list is
simply one set of possibilities requiring further investigation,
analysis, and-if necessary-action.
This list is not meant to connote an order of priority or
relative importance. Several issues that will be important
in the future-such as cleaning up toxic waste sites-are
not listed because they already are well-recognized. More
detailed information on each potential issue can be found
in Section 5 of the technical annex to this report, available
from the SAB.
Human Health Effects and Human Health Risk
Assessment
• Health problems and social disorder result from
environmental stress.
• The information highway is found to produce psychological
and societal impacts.
• New understanding of secondary air pollutants and their
risks requires new risk control strategies.
• The total toxic air burden, including synergistic effects
among pollutants, requires new, simultaneous risk
management strategies.
• Emphasis is placed on multiple end-points and multiple
exposures requiring new risk management criteria.
• The application of major advances in basic biomedical
sciences leads to radically new methods of human health
risk assessment and management.
• Methods to assess and manage exposures and risks from
infectious agents are found to be inadequate.
• Technology to control newly recognized pathogens in
drinking water is found to be inadequate.
Climatological Effects and Their Assessment And
Management
. The need to understand the mechanisms and effects of
local climate change is recognized.
. The need to understand the dynamics of the
counteracting effects of atmospheric particles and
greenhouse gases on global climate change becomes
critical.
Combined Human Health and Ecological Effects and
Their Assessment and Management
. Animal and human health (e.g., reproductive capacity)
and ecosystems are affected adversely by global
dispersion of estrogen-mimicking chemicals.
. Long-range transport and global accumulations of
pollutants are found to be sources of adverse health and
ecological effects.
. The need to develop and use early warning signs of
potential environmental problems is recognized.
. The introduction of exotic species into ecosystems
requires the development of new methods of risk
assessment and management.
. The need to establish and maintain an encompassing
environmental data resource for risk management
purposes is recognized.
. The need to assess unregulated, unevaluated agents
(existing and newly introduced) and their unforeseen
environmental impacts is recognized.
Radiation: Health and Environmental Assessment
And Management
. Major health hazards of non-ionizing radiation are
demonstrated.
. Increasing ground-level ultraviolet radiation results in
massive adverse effects on plant and animal life.
. Releases of radioactive materials through accident, war, or
terrorism lead to the search for better control mechanisms.
-------
Intergovernmental - Governmental - Institutional
• Local, regional, and global transport and accumulation of
pollutants from developing countries becomes a major
international environmental problem.
• Inefficient use of energy in transportation and other
sectors has growing adverse impact on global
environmental quality.
• Increased use of lead and other metals in "clean"
vehicles leads to increased potential for adverse impacts
on environmental quality.
Urban infrastructure decay leads to additional and
unexpected sources of adverse environmental incidents.
• The environment and U.S. industrial competitiveness are
at risk from non-optimal environmental strategies and
their costs.
• Industrial uses of wastes cause new problems.
• Scientific/technical core competencies in EPA prove to
be inadequate as future challenges arise.
• Environmental problems result from rapid growth in
developing countries.
• Local climate changes and environmental impacts result
from the use of alternative energy sources.
• Environmental emergencies caused by accidents,
terrorism, or crime require enhanced capabilities for
international response.
Environmental degradation in developing countries is
exacerbated by poorly controlled exports from developed
countries.
Socioeconomic Factors
. Voluntary initiatives fail to produce changes in behavior
needed to sustain and improve environmental quality.
. Environmental inequity leads to environmental apathy and
violence.
Land Use Issues
Increasing environmental pressures require improved
land-use practices.
. Increasing agricultural intensity in developing countries
increases soil depletion, atmospheric particulates, and
desertification.
. Inadequate capabilities exist to cope with the
environmental consequences of natural disasters.
Ecological Effects, Their Assessment and
Management
. The development of regional strategies for environmental
assessment and protection is necessary.
. Increasing light pollution is found to be seriously
disruptive to many species' physiology and behavior.
. Increasing noise pollution is found to disrupt many
species' essential behavior patterns.
. Cumulative environmental stresses lead to increasing
decline and die-off of sentinel species.
. The use of alternate energy sources leads to adverse
impacts on environmental quality.
. Global climate changes and stratospheric ozone
depletion lead to adverse impacts on ecological systems.
. Losses of monoculture crops occur because of
unexpected pathogens.
Resource Use and Depletion
. Biodiversity is lost as a result of habitat alteration and
destruction.
. The "health" of the oceans deteriorates further.
Fossil fuel depletion leads to the use of other
contaminating, habitat-destructive alternatives.
. Adverse ecological effects result from over-exploitation
of natural terrestrial resources.
. The quality and quantity of surface and groundwater
diminish as a result of inefficient use and contamination.
Other Risk Management Issues
. The continuing lack of societal consensus on criteria for
"acceptable" risk leads to policy gridlock.
. Preventing dispersion of chemicals from diverse sources
becomes more critical than point source management.
. The discovery that adverse effects occur at ever-lower
exposures leads to the need to develop new means of
managing the net risks of multiple pollutant exposures.
-------
land development. As the stresses on
biosystems intensify, the preservation of
biodiversity will become increasingly
important for both economic and en-
vironmental reasons. As populations
grow and urban areas expand, height-
ened competition for the use of land
will put new strains on natural habitats.
"Management of human
health risks in the future
will have to
consider the full ran^e
of health effects under
conditions of both
single and multiple
exposures."
In the years ahead, failure to maintain
healthy terrestrial ecosystems could
lead to natural resource damage, irre-
versible losses of species, and fragmen-
tation of habitats, thus endangering
both economic and environmental
sustainability and seriously threatening
human and ecological wellbeing.
Non-Cancer Human Health Effects
The human health effects that can re-
sult from environmental pollution in-
clude many endpoints in addition to
cancer. The loss of fertility and birth
defects, for example, have been linked
to certain organic chemicals. Develop-
mental problems in children, neurologi-
cal deficits, faster aging of the lung, and
increased rates of mortality and morbid-
ity have been associated with lead, mer-
cury, ozone, and ambient particulate
matter, respectively. Management of
human health risks in the future will
have to consider the full range of health
effects under conditions of both single
and multiple exposures.
A good example of the kind of hu-
man health problem that already is
sending early warning signals is the pos-
sible "feminization" of animals and hu-
mans. An increased occurrence of ad-
verse health effects (e.g., immature
male sex organs) in wildlife may be as-
sociated with exposures to estrogen-
mimicking compounds in the environ-
ment. Since humans are exposed to the
same chemical compounds, they may be
subject to similar risks. For example,
lower sperm counts currently being de-
tected in human males could be linked
to exposures to estrogen-mimicking
compounds.
Total Air Pollutant Loadings
In the future, total loadings of pollut-
ants in and from the atmosphere may
pose environmental problems not seen
before, or intensify familiar problems
beyond the point where conventional
controls will solve them. For example,
aggregate increases in the use of fossil
fuels, combined with long-range trans-
port and local conditions, could lead to
regional or global air quality problems
(e.g., acid rain and global warming).
Deposition of air-borne contaminants
could exacerbate problems on land or
in the water, problems that demand new
kinds of responses. Because many air-
borne chemicals are more harmful to
human health and ecological systems
when acting in the presence of other
chemicals, the deposition and accumu-
lation of multiple chemicals over time
may lead to human health and ecologi-
cal damage (e.g., problems related to
the leaching of heavy metals from soil).
Non-traditional Environmental Stressors
In the future, previously unrecognized
environmental stressors, and recognized
stressors that are not adequately moni-
tored or regulated, may be found to pose
serious risks to human health or eco-
systems. Many unregulated chemicals
present in complex mixtures have been
linked to such problems as sick build-
ing syndrome, multiple chemical sen-
sitivity, and excess morbidity and mor-
tality rates related to air-borne fine par-
ticles. Control-resistant microbes,
plants, and insects; new kinds of water-
borne pathogens; the accidental or mis-
guided introduction of an exotic spe-
cies into susceptible ecosystems: any of
-------
these factors could lead to human
health or ecological problems in the fu-
ture. Moreover, relatively well-under-
stood stressors could begin to cause new
kinds of problems through the slow
building of cumulative effects, or the
subtle effects of well-understood stres-
sors (e.g., developmental defects in
children exposed to low levels of lead)
could cause new public concerns.
Health of the Oceans
The oceans, their complex biosystems,
and their related food webs are likely
to come under increasing stress from the
worldwide activities of a growing glo-
bal population. The adverse effects of
overfishing, air and water-borne pollut-
ants, and coastal development on the
health and abundance of marine life, in-
cluding the ecologically critical coral
reefs, already are causing concerns in
coastal areas. The migration of coastal
stressors far from shore threatens the
future health of the deep, open ocean
as well. Pollutants like PCBs, pesticides,
and lead have been found not only in
the tissues of fish and marine mammals,
but also in bottom sediments and in the
seawater itself. Solid waste can be found
sparsely distributed throughout the
open ocean. Moreover, future exploita-
tion of minerals and oceanic plant life
could degrade the ocean environment
even further, as similar activities on
land have done.
6. The Environment:
A Strategic National
Interest
National and international environ-
mental issues are rapidly becoming a
matter of strategic national interest.
The United States is part of a
single global ecosystem. Political,
economic, and environmental trends
and events in other countries affect
the United States; pollution gener-
ated in this country affects the rest
of the world as well. Because of in-
ternational environmental and eco-
nomic linkages, environmental issues
rapidly are becoming an issue of stra-
tegic national interest.
Within the past few years, the
American people have seen firsthand
the links between the environment and
national security. Nations have gone to
war to protect their access to vital natu-
ral resources. Others have used environ-
mental destruction in combat as a ma-
jor instrument of war. Terrorism, envi-
ronmental accidents like Chernobyl,
and nuclear proliferation all have ma-
jor implications for public and ecosys-
tem health in this country and around
the world.
Possible natural resource short-
ages, competition for scarce resources
like potable water, and the transborder
movement of refugees driven by dete-
riorating environmental conditions
could lead to destabilized governments,
international disagreements, and re-
gional warfare. Overfishing, acid rain,
and raw wastewater discharges along
and across national borders also are ex-
amples of how environmental and natu-
ral resource issues can lead to conten-
tious relations among countries, and ne-
cessitate international negotiations and
agreements related to environmental
quality.
Moreover, the future quality of the
global environment will be a factor in
determining how economic activities
are conducted in all countries, includ-
ing the United States. Based on present
trends, the future growth of the econo-
mies in regions such as Asia and Latin
America, for example, with an atten-
dant increase in energy use, could con-
tribute to global atmospheric pollution
that today is caused primarily by
economically developed nations. The
loss of biodiversity through the clear-
ing of rain forests in South America and
Indonesia would be felt by everyone on
earth. The stripfishing of marine life in
the open ocean is diminishing the
foodstocks available to global popula-
tions over the long term.
As can be seen from these ex-
amples, many future environmental is-
sues, and their relationship to economic
development, are likely to be matters
of strategic national interest, both to
the United States and to other coun-
-------
tries, at the dawn of a new century. En-
vironmental and natural resource-re-
lated issues almost certainly will be
linked to U.S. national security con-
cerns and to a range of bilateral and
multilateral relationships.
"EPA must look
beyond the horizon.
And the Agency must
he prepared to think
in new ways, and act
in new ways, based on
what it sees."
7. Thinking of Futures at EPA
To limit or avoid future environmen-
tal problems, there is a need for EPA
to expand its current capabilities and
look beyond near-term problems to
long-term environmental protection.
As the Federal agency primarily
responsible for protecting the envi-
ronment, EPA has been charged with
implementing environmental laws
that have been, in large part, reac-
tive. Just as those laws were enacted
in response to existing problems, EPA
spends most of its time and budget
cleaning up, or remediating, pollu-
tion problems that already are rela-
tively serious, or that already are
causing public concern because of
real or perceived environmental im-
pacts. This approach has achieved
considerable success in the past.
However, EPA will not be able
to limit or prevent future environ-
mental problems with the same regu-
latory tools and reactive approaches
that it has used-and used effec-
tively-in the past. As EPA prepares
for a future that will be as challeng-
ing as it is uncertain, the Agency
must develop new analytical tools,
new approaches to decisionmaking,
and new partnerships with stakehold-
ers. It must develop a capacity to an-
ticipate problems and respond to
them long before their adverse effects
are widely felt. The Agency must
broaden its understanding of what
causes environmental problems, and
it must broaden its approach-both
internal and external-to solving
them.
EPA cannot undertake this effort
alone. For the past several years, the
Agency has been increasing its coop-
erative efforts with other Federal
agencies, state governments, non-
government organizations, interna-
tional groups, and the private sector
in order to solve existing environ-
mental problems. That cooperative
role will be even more important as
the Agency responds to environmen-
tal problems anticipated in the future.
EPA is positioned to play an in-
fluential role in focusing resources-
both from within and outside the
Agency-on environmental problems
that may emerge in the future. EPA
could help coordinate and assess the
environmental implications of the fu-
tures research already underway in
other parts of government. The
Agency could work more closely with
the U.S. business community to an-
ticipate the future environmental im-
plications of technological innova-
tion. EPA could work more closely
with the U.S. Department of State,
international organizations, and the
agencies of other nations to identify
the drivers of emerging regional or
global problems, and then help define
possible responses to them.
The environmental problems of
the future undoubtedly will be facets
of large-scale economic, demo-
graphic, and technological change.
Other organizations-go vernment
and non-government, within and
outside this country-will have ma-
jor responsibilities responding to that
change. Thus, EPA's involvement in
partnerships with other organizations
will be even more important in the
future.
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A forward-looking EPA also will
need to change its organizational phi-
losophy and develop new analytical
tools. EPA will be unable to respond
quickly and effectively to what are
likely to be complex, synergistic
problems if it continues to use a one-
at-a-time, single-stressor, single-spe-
cies, single-medium, single-end-point
approach.
In the face of expected change,
EPA has to look beyond urban
airsheds to a future where large,
multi-state, or international regions
are affected by total loadings of at-
mospheric pollutants that have been
transported thousands of miles. EPA
has to look beyond its pollutant-by-
pollutant control of a relative hand-
ful of well-recognized stressors to a
future where new chemicals, materi-
als, bioengineered species, and other
new agents-either singly or in com-
bination-may cause unanticipated
human health and ecological effects.
EPA has to look beyond pesticide
pollution to a future where habitat
loss may be the critical ecological
threat. EPA has to look beyond the
cancer end-point to a future where
several health endpoints may be af-
fected synergistically by multiple
stressors, some well-understood, but
more unknown. EPA has to look be-
yond the protection of estuaries,
coastal waters, and marine fish stocks
to a future where the oceans them-
selves may be threatened by a vari-
ety of economic activities in coun-
tries thousands of miles apart and in
the oceans themselves.
In short, EPA must look beyond
the horizon. And the Agency must be
prepared to think in new ways, and act
in new ways, based on what it sees.
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Recommendation 1
As much attention should be given to
avoiding future environmental
problems as to controlling current
ones.
Recommendations On
Environmental Futures
Solving the environmental problems of
the future is not a responsibility that
should be left entirely to future genera-
tions, or only to EPA. The forces of
change that will cause those problems
are at work now, and people today have
a responsibility to shape those forces in
ways that will reduce risks, and costs,
in the future. Because actions taken
today by government and non-govern-
ment organizations, the private sector,
and communities will influence envi-
ronmental quality-for better or
worse-in the future, people today have
a responsibility to consider the future
consequences of their choices and
lifestyles.
Accepting responsibility for the
future is not simply a matter of
intergenerational equity. It is an idea
that builds on the distinctly American
belief that each generation should leave
its children and grandchildren with a
better life.
EPA, and the nation, must begin
to think more systematically about en-
vironmental problems that could
emerge in the future. EPA in particular
must begin to focus public attention on
environmental problems while they are
still beyond the horizon, and then
stimulate action-if needed-to solve
them.
This orientation to the future re-
quires a broader vision at EPA. It calls
for an Agency that goes beyond envi-
ronmental regulation to environmen-
tal protection in its broadest sense, an
Agency committed to anticipating pos-
sible future environmental problems as
well as controlling present and past
ones.
To fulfill its basic responsibility to
protect the environment, now and in
the future, EPA needs to incorporate a
new emphasis on environmental fore-
sight into all its activities, including
long-range planning, budgeting, re-
search and development, and program
management. In the past, these activi-
ties have been driven by near-term exi-
gencies like legislative deadlines and
the most recent environmental crisis.
EPA always will be subject to such pres-
sures, but it must be better prepared for
the long term as well.
EPA should not consider this an
exercise apart from or in addition to its
existing responsibilities. If EPA's futures
capabilities are to be effective, they
must be integrated into EPA's ongoing
programs as a unique but fully interre-
lated part. EPA should provide the re-
sources necessary to establish environ-
mental foresight as a critical EPA func-
tion to be carried out-continuously
and systematically-over the long term.
To help communicate the results of
its futures research to the public, EPA
should consider issuing-once every two
years at most-a report that describes po-
tential environmental conditions 20 years
into the future under several sets of as-
sumptions. Although the prospective
conditions described would be uncertain,
the ensuing public discussion and debate
would be an invaluable stimulus to pub-
lic thinking about the future. The report
and public debate also would stimulate
research and data collection efforts to re-
solve uncertainties, and that research in
turn would clarify the vision of the fu-
ture described in subsequent reports. A
periodic report on environmental futures
thus would help focus public thinking
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beyond the horizon, and provide a basis
for public support of action-if neces-
sary-in the present.
The development of futures capa-
bilities at EPA carries with it an ongoing
obligation. Besides providing a suitable
budget for the processes of environmen-
tal foresight, the Agency must be pre-
pared to evaluate findings, interact with
other agencies and organizations, and
possibly act on the early warnings that
those processes might detect. Some of
those early warnings undoubtedly will
prove incorrect; nevertheless, if expecta-
tions are raised without appropriate bud-
get and follow-through, opportunities will
be missed, and results will be disappoint-
ing. On the other hand, if the Agency
can infuse its policymaking with fresh in-
sights, a sense of dynamism, and a more
explicit understanding of future possibili-
ties, the Agency and the nation will reap
substantial environmental and economic
benefits over the long run.
Recommendation 2
As an essential part of its futures
capabilities, EPA should establish an
early-warnig system to identify
potential future environmental risks.
One essential part of EPA's futures capa-
bility should be an early-warning system
that alerts the Agency and the nation to
specific environmental issues that may
emerge in the future. To help provide this
early warning, EPA should establish a
look-out panel made up of individuals
from inside and outside the Federal gov-
ernment. Besides identifying issues, the
look-out panel should screen, evaluate,
and prioritize them. (One possible way
for EPA to establish and use a look-out
panel is described in the box on page 23.)
During the course of this project,
the EFC itself acted as a look-out panel;
i.e., it applied the experience and ex-
pertise of the SAB to identify 50 pos-
sible environmental issues that could
emerge over the next 30 years. EPA
should use this list as the starting point
for a rigorous, ongoing effort to iden-
tify likely emerging issues, assess and
prioritize them, and begin to define
appropriate responses.
In particular, EPA should review the
issues identified by the EFC, and subject
one or two to a rigorous analysis that in-
volves other agencies or organizations
with relevant expertise. Trend data
should be identified and analyzed, and
possible response options assessed. EPA's
periodic futures report should include this
information.
This kind of pilot project would
serve several purposes. It would help fo-
cus the Agency's initial futures research.
It would initiate contacts with other gov-
ernment agencies and non-government
organizations involved in futures re-
search. It would begin to establish a pro-
cess for prioritizing potential future issues
for possible near-term response. Finally,
it would help EPA gain experience in as-
sessing the effectiveness of different re-
sponse options.
The choice of initial issues to study
is not as important as beginning the pro-
cess itself. EPA needs to develop a much
greater capacity to anticipate environ-
mental futures and identify specific issues
that could emerge. It must develop the
capability to screen those issues, solicit
an external review of findings, and then
analyze the range of response options
available.
The EFC has taken the first step in
environmental foresight through the
look-out panel that contributed to this
report. EPA should build on this effort by
establishing an early-warning system that
would identify, rank, and begin the pro-
cess of responding to environmental is-
sues that are still beyond the horizon.
Recommendation 3
In a longer-term, more
comprehensive effort, EPA should
evaluate five overarching
environmental problem areas related
to a number of potential future
environmental issues.
Over the next 5 to 30 years, future envi-
ronmental quality could be affected by
social, economic, and technological
-------
changes already underway in the United
States and around the world. Because of
several factors (e.g., likely severity, vis-
ibility to the public, and probability of
occurring), some of these problems merit
more thorough analysis by EPA and other
appropriate agencies. As EPA undertakes
to strengthen its futures capabilities, it
should pay particular attention to five
major problem areas that encompass a
number of related environmental issues
that could emerge in the future.
Sustainability of Terrestrial Ecosystems
Despite a growing awareness of the vi-
tal links between viable ecosystems and
economic prosperity, scientific tools
useful for assessing the ecological risks
that result from the stressors on ecologi-
cal resources are not well developed.
The risks themselves are poorly under-
stood.
Through its framework for ecologi-
cal risk assessment, EPA has developed
a valuable conceptual approach. How-
ever, ecological risk assessment guide-
lines-analogous to EPA's human
health risk assessment guidelines-do
not yet exist.
The Agency should place a high
priority on identifying ecological end-
points-those aspects of biosystems
that readily manifest adverse change-
and developing guidelines for their use
in ecological risk assessments. The end-
points should be selected for their reli-
ability in assessing the effects of vari-
Prototype EPA Look-Out Panel
. EPA sets up a prototype "look-out panel" with experts in public
health, ecology, socioeconomics, and technology.
. Although managed by EPA, the panel also involves a variety of
experts who can observe changes that may lead to problems
beyond the horizon.
. Panelists are requested periodically to scan their fields and
provide observations about new or intensifying trends and their
possible consequences.
* These observations are collected and fed back to other
panelists for comment.
. Candidate environmental issues are screened against
established criteria.
. Selected issues are analyzed in the context of scenarios and
goals developed by the Agency.
ous stressors on ecosystem
sustainability, and for their usefulness
in monitoring ecosystem status and
trends. Special attention should be
given to the further development of
ecological risk assessment guidelines
that can address problems associated
with loss and fragmentation of terres-
trial habitats, freshwater and near
coastal zone eutrophication, and the in-
troduction of exotic species.
Non-Cancer Human Health Effects
Although EPA in the past has been
concerned almost exclusively with a
narrow range of health endpoints (i.e.,
the various forms of cancer), the
Agency should place equal emphasis on
non-cancer human health risks. An in-
creasing body of data shows that, in
many cases, a range of significant bio-
logical responses can be affected ad-
versely by environmental factors. As
part of its effort to anticipate future en-
vironmental problems, EPA should
broaden its human health research and
regulatory focus to include respiratory,
cardiovascular, immunologic, neuro-
logic, and reproductive endpoints.
For many endpoints, the biologic
changes cannot be measured simply by
effects on DNA. Such changes are com-
plex, involving the interaction of many
organ systems (e.g., the neural, hor-
monal, and immunologic systems).
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Thus new dose-response models should
be considered. In fact, the total dose or
dose rate may not be the most impor-
tant variable affecting some human
health endpoints. Instead, a specific
dose at a specific time in organ devel-
opment may be a critical variable.
Different people are affected in
different ways by exposures to the same
environmental pollutants. As science
expands its understanding of the differ-
ences in human susceptibility, EPA
should continue broadening its ap-
proach to human health risk assessment
by explicitly considering risks to suscep-
tible populations.
Total Air Pollutant loadings
EPA historically has protected air qual-
ity by focusing on one pollutant or one
impact at a time. This pollutant-by-pol-
lutant approach does not effectively
address complex interactions among at-
mospheric processes, the synergism of
pollutants and their impacts, or the
deposition of air-borne pollutants on
water or land. The long-term, long-dis-
tance, and often international charac-
teristics of air pollution are not ad-
equately considered.
To improve current approaches,
EPA needs to develop a broader defini-
tion of the total air burden, a defini-
tion that includes new and emerging air
toxics as well as currently regulated
pollutants. Also needed is a system for
addressing diverse pollutant sources and
the effects of the total air pollution bur-
den on air, water, and land. Given the
lower and perhaps more uncertain
thresholds associated with the total air
burden, EPA should shift its focus from
the regulation of single pollutants to the
control of multiple pollutants based on
comparative risk estimates. Integrated
assessments of the multimedia effects of
air-borne pollutants also may be
needed.
Finally, because all airsheds are
interlinked across state and sometimes
national borders, the long-term protec-
tion of U.S. air quality will depend to
some extent on the protection of air
quality in other countries. The United
States should continue to provide in-
ternational leadership in an effort to
link air quality issues with other envi-
ronmental, energy, social, and
economic concerns.
Non-Traditional Environmental Stressors
Up to this point in its history, EPA has
paid attention to-and attempted to
control-only a limited number of en-
vironmental stressors (e.g., the most
ubiquitous hazardous air pollutants and
a limited number of drinking water con-
taminants and pesticide residues in
food). EPA currently requires U.S. com-
panies to regularly monitor only those
chemicals likely to be released and
therefore limited by permits and regu-
lations. Larger companies are required
to report, facility-by-facility, their re-
leases of about 325 toxic chemicals.
U.S. wastewater treatment facilities
have to monitor and control a relatively
small number of well-recognized pollut-
ants. For infectious diseases, the indi-
cator species monitored in drinking
water and coastal beach waters are, at
best, only crude indicators of infectious
risk.
Because future environmental
quality may be at risk from environmen-
tal stressors other than the chemical
and microbiological contaminants
monitored and regulated in the past,
EPA needs to improve its capabilities
to identify, understand, and, if neces-
sary, target for control a greater num-
ber of those stressors that could lead to
future risks. Examples of some poten-
tially important stressors not presently
monitored include the new technolo-
gies that could increase human expo-
sure to various forms of non-ionizing
radiation, the persistent chlorinated
hydrocarbons that could disrupt endo-
crine systems in humans and animals,
and the newly-recognized pathogens
that are being found in drinking water.
EPA should attempt to identify, moni-
tor, and analyze the most potentially se-
rious of these unconventional stressors,
and then assess their adverse effects on
human health and ecological systems.
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Health of the Oceans
Although indications of deterioration
in ocean health are still preliminary
and subject to scientific debate, the
scope and value of the resource at risk
are undeniably enormous. Thus the
early warning signs of possible ocean
deterioration-the "dot on the hori-
zon"-should be taken seriously. Co-
ordinated, international steps should
be taken now to better define the
causes and effects of ocean pollution,
and to anticipate problems that may
require a coordinated international
response in the future.
For example, much more needs to
be known about conditions and trends
in the open ocean. Current adverse ef-
fects already evident in the oceans need
to be monitored more widely and bet-
ter understood. Although the effects of
overfishing on human nutrition and in-
ternational economics are apparent,
more needs to be learned about the ef-
fect of these "holes" in the food web on
other marine organisms.
Further, international coopera-
tion is needed to gather and analyze
information that now is scattered
among different agencies and coun-
tries. This effort is essential to iden-
tifying gaps in knowledge and direct-
ing future research. Coordinated ac-
tion should include studies of the life
cycles of ocean flora and fauna, sam-
pling and analysis of their tissues and
the ocean's waters and sediments, and
efforts to expand current understand-
ing of marine toxicology,
ecotoxicology, and the relationships
between coastal and deep waters and
between oceanic and terrestrial en-
vironments.
These types of studies will require
many years of coordinated international
effort. Given the early warning signals
now being observed, and the value of
oceans to long-term economic and eco-
system sustainability, such coordinated
efforts should begin as soon as possible.
Recommendation 4
EPA should stimulate coordinated
national efforts to anticipate and
respond to environmental change.
In its report Reducing Risk (Septem-
ber 1990), the SAB recommended
that EPA increase its efforts to inte-
grate environmental considerations
into broader aspects of public policy.
That recommendation was based on
a finding that environmental quality
is affected by national policies related
to energy use, agriculture, economic
development, transportation, and for-
eign relations. Consequently, EPA
was advised to work closely with the
appropriate Federal agencies to en-
sure their policies are sensitive to po-
tential environmental impacts.
Since 1990, this integration of en-
vironmental considerations into
broader national policy has taken place
in a number of areas. For example, EPA
has worked fruitfully with the Depart-
ment of Transportation to implement
the Intermodal Surface Transportation
Efficiency Act (ISTEA), and the
Agency is playing an important role
working with the Department of
Energy's implementation of the Energy
Policy Act. EPA has participated with
a number of Federal agencies to develop
its Environmental Monitoring and As-
sessment Program (EMAP) and the
National Human Exposure Assessment
Survey (NHEXAS). This progress is
encouraging.
The same kind of cooperation is
needed to anticipate, and respond to,
potential environmental risks in the
future. EPA should develop stronger
partnerships with other Federal agen-
cies, state governments, and relevant
non-government organizations in-
volved in futures-related activities. In
particular, EPA should undertake coop-
erative efforts to: 1) improve and inte-
grate environment-related futures re-
search; 2) focus national attention on
drivers of environmental change; 3) im-
prove environmental education and
awareness; and 4) develop an integrated
environmental data system.
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Improve and Integrate Environment-Related
Futures Research
A number of Federal agencies, private
businesses, and non-government orga-
nizations currently conduct foresight
activities, but those activities tend to
be discontinuous-depending on bud-
gets-and coordinated poorly, if at all.
EPA should work with them to improve
the methodologies used in futures re-
search, strengthen the linkages between
the various efforts, and ensure that the
environmental implications of futures
research are not ignored.
In particular, EPA may wish to
conduct its own analysis of the envi-
ronmental implications of futures re-
search at other Federal agencies, or it
may choose to work with the primary
agency involved. In any case, EPA
should work to make Federal foresight
efforts thorough, complementary, and
supportive of environmental policy-
making.
Moreover, EPA should reach out
to private businesses, state govern-
ments, and to other agencies and orga-
nizations within and outside the United
States that have experience in futures
research, especially environmental fu-
tures research. Such research should
feed into and complement EPA's work.
In fact, one of the most important con-
tributions that EPA could make in this
area is to help establish a forceful Fed-
eral presence that helps link the valu-
able foresight activities being con-
ducted elsewhere.
Finally, EPA should work with
other organizations to improve the un-
derstanding and expand the use of en-
vironment-related futures research by
other parts of the Federal government.
The U.S. Congress and the science of-
fices in the White House, for example,
should use environmental foresight
more extensively in their activities.
EPA can help make that happen.
Focus National Attention on Drivers o
Environmental Change
Because of historical circumstances and
its legislative mandates, EPA has
tended to focus its energies on the en-
vironmental end results of broad eco-
nomic, demographic, and technologi-
cal changes ( e.g., controlling emissions
from cars and forcing changes in fuel
to reduce urban ozone pollution, im-
proving the design and operation of
landfills and incinerators to minimize
waste-related contamination of soil and
groundwater). Only recently has EPA
begun to attack the roots of such prob-
lems (e.g., influencing the design of
consumer products to reduce environ-
mental impacts, encouraging reductions
in waste Streams through pollution pre-
vention).
To limit or avoid future environ-
mental problems, the nation and EPA
must pay more attention to the forces-
or drivers-behind those problems. The
increased concentration of people in
urban corridors; the development and
use of new technologies, manufacturing
processes, and materials; the expanded
use of fossil fuels both in this country
and abroad: these kinds of future, large-
scale changes are likely to give impetus
to new kinds of environmental prob-
lems that demand new kinds of re-
sponses. To the extent that the Ameri-
can people and EPA understand-and
anticipate-the drivers of change, and
then take action to avoid the problems
they may engender, the risks and costs
imposed on future generations will be
reduced.
For example, EPA may not be able
to influence the growth of heavily-
populated urban transportation corri-
dors, but anticipating that growth be-
fore the fact, and recognizing that such
growth may overwhelm current tech-
niques and technologies for controlling
air pollution, may give EPA and other
agencies the head start they need to
develop new, more effective options for
remediation. Similarly, by anticipating
the future widespread use of new mate-
rials (in the batteries of electric ve-
hicles, for example), EPA could begin
to assess potential recycling, reuse, and
disposal problems.
In short, future environmental
conditions are likely to be shaped in
large part by forces of change already
-------
evident. EPA should not wait for those
conditions to manifest themselves be-
fore the Agency begins to formulate its
response. It should begin studying the
forces of change now, and then give the
nation an early evaluation of how those
changes could affect the environment.
Improve Environmental Awareness
Education
One of the single most important driv-
ers of environmental change in the fu-
ture will be the environmental aware-
ness and attitudes of people in this
country and abroad. Environmental
awareness influences individual behav-
ior, and individual behavior is a funda-
mental factor affecting environmental
conditions. A country's environmental
laws and institutions are shaped by the
environmental awareness of its citizens,
as awareness is translated into policy.
Because environmental awareness will
exert such a strong influence on future
environmental conditions, EPA's efforts
to anticipate and respond to future en-
vironmental problems should include a
strengthened commitment to environ-
mental information and education.
In its 1990 report Reducing Risk,
the SAB made a similar recommenda-
tion in the context of expanding the
types of tools used to reduce risk. The
SAB recommended that EPA use infor-
mation and education, among other
things, to complement the Agency's
and
more traditional command-and-control
regulatory approach. Information and
education clearly are the most useful
risk reduction tools for certain kinds of
environmental problems, and, as dem-
onstrated by EPA's pollution prevention
and environmental education pro-
grams, the Agency has been using those
tools more often and more effectively
over the past few years.
Seen in the context of potential
future environmental problems, the
improved environmental awareness of
the general public is even more impor-
tant. An informed and alert public
serves, in fact, as a broad-based look-
out panel that can see and draw atten-
tion to the first signs of unusual envi-
ronmental degradation in the future.
An aware and concerned public will be
more likely to volunteer to collect the
sampling data (e.g., during nationwide
bird counts and beach cleanups) that is
useful in illustrating particular environ-
mental conditions. Most important, a
public that is sensitive to the environ-
mental implications of personal behav-
ior will be more willing to act quickly
"A country's
environmental laws and
institutions are shaped
by the environmental
awareness of its citizens,
as awareness is
translated into policy."
if behavioral changes are needed in re-
sponse to future environmental
problems.
While EPA is only one of several
government agencies that have a role
in providing public education and in-
formation, it has the primary Federal re-
sponsibility for environmental protec-
tion. Consequently, it is appropriate for
EPA to take the lead in formulating a
national environmental education and
information program explicitly focused
on environmental futures. Key partici-
pants in this effort should include state
-------
and local school administrators, teach-
ers, parents, students, businesses, and
the media.
Futures-oriented environmental
education also should be promoted on
an international basis. Given the im-
portant linkages between personal be-
havior and cultural values-and their
influential role in national economic
and environmental policies-informa-
tion as to how citizens can improve en-
vironmental quality will be a critical
component in reducing future environ-
mental risks. Multilateral institutions
and non-government organizations are
especially suited for funding and imple-
menting environmental education and
awareness programs in cooperation with
national and local governments.
Develop an Integrated Environmental
Data System
To better understand the different
mechanisms of future environmental
stress, and the range of possible human
health and ecosystem effects, EPA
should begin working with states, in-
dustry, other Federal agencies, and in-
ternational organizations to construct
a broad, integrated database that could
be used to link perceived or suspected
effects with possible stressors. Such a
database would help users identify pre-
viously undetected and incipient eco-
logical or human health changes. Data
analysis could provide early-warning
signals of increased human or ecosys-
tem exposures to conventional and un-
conventional stressors. When com-
bined with improved understanding of
biological responses to such exposures,
this analysis could help guide policy and
action well before severe ecological and
human health effects were documented.
Before trends in atmospheric,
aquatic, and soil contamination can be
studied, baseline data must be collected
over a sustained period from a network
of background sampling stations. Data
collected at such stations, whether they
are fixed-site, mobile, or satellite moni-
toring systems, have to be subject to
quality-control and made available to
analysts inside and outside government.
Most important, these data have to fit
together to paint a consistent, coher-
ent picture of environmental quality. In
other words, if the data to be included
are selected carefully, their analytical
value in the aggregate will be greater
than the value of their separate parts.
Much of the data needed for such
a database already is being collected by
EPA and other agencies. For example,
earth-observing satellite systems oper-
ated by the National Aeronautics and
Space Administration (NASA) cur-
rently collect data on vegetative growth
patterns, atmospheric haze, and trace
gases. A National Health and Nutrition
Examination Survey (NHANES) is
conducted on a regular basis by the
Department of Health and Human Ser-
vices (DHHS). EPA collects an enor-
mous amount of data related to air qual-
ity, drinking water quality, human ex-
posure (NHEXAS), and ecological sta-
tus and trends (EMAP), among other
things. The Fish and Wildlife Service,
the Forest Service, the National
Oceanographic and Atmospheric Ad-
ministration, scientists under contract
to the National Science Foundation,
and others collect data describing a va-
riety of environmental conditions. The
Federal and state health care systems
collect detailed information on overall
U.S. mortality and morbidity rates,
while DHHS and various states collect
occupational health and exposure data
in surveillance networks.
A particularly useful, and previ-
ously unavailable, source of environ-
mental data is the Department of De-
fense (DOD). DOD already has in place
data-gathering equipment and data-
bases useful for assessing global-scale
ecosystems. EPA should tap into DOD's
expertise in this area, and integrate
DOD's equipment and methods with
more traditional environmental data-
gathering efforts.
As evidenced by this partial list of
Federal data-gathering activities, the
problem in constructing an integrated
data network useful for anticipating fu-
ture environmental issues is not neces-
sarily the need for more data or larger
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data collection budgets. Rather, the
challenge will be to assemble useful data
already being collected into a coherent
database that is accessible to a wide
variety of users.
EPA should review the different
kinds of environmental and health sur-
veillance data currently available, and
then identify the set that is potentially
most useful for anticipating environ-
mental futures. If there are clear gaps
in the data, the Agency should recom-
mend ways for closing those gaps.
Working with the primary collectors of
data, EPA should help design a compre-
hensive system for aggregating critical
data elements, updating the data, assur-
ing its quality, and making the infor-
mation widely available to users inside
and outside the government, and inside
and outside the United States.
Recommendation 5
EPA, as well as other agencies and
organizations, should recognize that
global environmental quality is a
matter of strategic nutional interest.
There is little doubt that political, eco-
nomic, and environmental events in
other countries can affect environmen-
tal quality in the United States. Even
when such events do not affect the U.S.
environment directly, as with the oil
fires in Kuwait, they can affect inter-
national environmental and economic
resources in which the United States
has a strategic interest. Consequently,
to protect both the national interest
and the quality of the U.S. environ-
ment over the long term, it is essential
that global environmental quality be
recognized-publicly and formally-as
a strategic interest of the United States.
In the past, the role of environ-
mental issues in U.S. foreign policy has
been determined on a case-by-case ba-
sis. An overall, strategic environmen-
tal policy has never been defined for
this country. U.S. foreign policy objec-
tives related to the environment have
not been articulated, environmental
risk contingencies have not been iden-
tified, and the criteria for various lev-
els of U.S. action in the face of an en-
vironmental emergency have not been
laid out.
This shortfall in strategic thinking
could be detrimental in a future where
international competition for natural
resources like ocean fish and potable
water may pose as much of a threat to
international political stability as an
interrupted oil supply does today. More-
over, environmental terrorism, the
large-scale dislocation and migration of
people because of deteriorating envi-
ronmental conditions, and the rapid
growth and urbanization of global popu-
lations all could pose potential risks to
global environmental quality.
In this context, the protection of
environmental quality represents one of
the most important strategic issues fac-
ing the United States in the 21st cen-
tury. To anticipate and forestall the en-
vironmental problems of the future, the
United States must begin to develop
strategic national policies that link na-
tional security, foreign relations, envi-
ronmental quality, and economic
growth. EPA should play a strongly sup-
portive role in this process.
Over a number of years, the U.S.
government-including EPA-has
undertaken a series of cooperative en-
vironmental activities with other
countries such as China, Russia, and
Japan. EPA is contributing to an en-
vironmental office in Budapest to as-
sist Central European countries re-
dress the environmental problems
created and neglected while they
were part of the Soviet Bloc. These
efforts, and others like them in the
Caribbean region and Asia, contrib-
ute U.S. experience and technical ex-
pertise to cooperative efforts aimed
at remediating existing environmen-
tal problems in other parts of the
world.
The U.S. Government should ex-
pand such cooperative international ac-
tivities and target them not only at ex-
isting problems but also at the larger
forces or drivers (e.g., population
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growth and urbanization, increased fos-
sil fuel use, technological develop-
ments, environmental attitudes) that
may contribute to future problems. Be-
sides helping other countries control air
pollution in urban areas, for example,
EPA should be prepared to assist them
in identifying options for minimizing
such problems in the first place (i.e.,
through the use of alternative fuels or
innovative energy-efficient technolo-
gies). In other words, as EPA begins to
anticipate future environmental prob-
lems in this country, the Agency should
join with other nations to apply the
same process internationally.
While EPA's technical and fi-
nancial involvement in such activi-
ties may provide substantial benefits
to other countries, this work also sup-
ports a well-defined national self-in-
terest. EPA simply will not be able to
anticipate, and respond to, U.S. en-
vironmental problems in the future
without considering the drivers of
change in other countries, and with-
out involving other countries, mul-
tilateral institutions, and non-gov-
ernment organizations. In the future,
many of the same environmental
problems that emerge in other coun-
tries are likely to emerge here, and
they are likely to be linked.
Many facets of this kind of
broad, futures-oriented activity lie
outside EPA's area of expertise. Some
nations, for example, may request and
need assistance in areas such as popu-
lation planning and alternative fuels
development, where other U.S. agen-
cies hold the primary responsibility.
Consequently, EPA should join with
other Federal agencies, multilateral
institutions, and non-government or-
ganizations in futures-oriented part-
nerships beyond its borders.
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The Reports of The SAB
Standing Committees
The Environmental Futures Committee invited the standing committees of the SAB to conduct futures exercises in their
areas of expertise, and then prepare reports on their conclusions and recommendations. The five reports that resulted from
this effort are summarized below. Anyone wishing a copy of these reports should write or call:
Committee Evaluation and Support Staff
Science Advisory Board
401 M St., S. W. (Mail Stop 1400)
Washington, B.C. 20460
(202) 260-8414
Report of the Drinking Water Committee (EPA-SAB-owc-95-oo2)
The Drinking Water Committee examined trends in water resource demands, water treatment technologies, and drinking water quality,
and their likely impacts on the country's ability to provide safe drinking water in the future. The committee offered five major recommendations:
1. Improve the existing management of renewable water resources.
A national program to improve existing renewable water
supplies should include: 1) prevention of further water supply
deterioration and better management of land-use and forestry
practices; 2) improved ability to capture a larger portion of
renewable water supplies, including through wetland protection
and expansion; and 3) implementation of water recycling and
conservation practices to improve efficiencies of water use,
including lining of irrigation canals, installation of more efficient
plumbing, and consideration of reallocation of water rights.
2. Support the consolidation of small distribution systems.
Consolidation of small water systems should be encouraged to
improve the overall quality of water and provide the necessary
revenue to implement treatment technologies now available to
the larger systems. The drive toward consolidation should take
advantage of the replacement of distribution systems that will
be necessary in the near future in many communities.
3. Support changes in treatment technologies.
The traditional concepts of water treatment and distribution
can be expected to change substantially in the future as a
result of the changing profiles of contaminants of concern. A
number of promising technologies, including membrane
treatment, will need to be improved and implemented. In
addition, methods will need to be developed for stabilizing
water in distribution systems that do not depend on
maintenance of a residual oxidant.
Greatly accelerate research to spur advances in risk assessment
methodologies for both chemical and microbiological
contaminants.
Modifications of current water disinfection treatments must
consider the magnitude of microbial risks that may be introduced
as a result of those modifications, as well as the creation of
other disinfection by-products. To do this effectively, substantial
research into risk assessment methodology for both chemical
and microbial risks is needed. Without such research, large public
investments for changes in drinking water treatment plants may
be made on an inadequate and possibly incorrect scientific basis.
Establish a surveillance or alert system for emerging water-borne
pathogens.
The almost certain changes in water treatment and distribution
systems in the next decades, and the increased consolidation
into larger systems for efficiency of control and delivery, pose
the possibility of generating and transmitting to large populations
heretofore unknown microorganisms that may pose serious
health risks. A surveillance or alert system to detect these
microorganisms early should be put in place.
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Report of the Ecological Processes and
Effects Committee (EPA-SAB-EPEC-QS-OOS)
The Ecological Processes and Effects Committee developed an
approach for examining key future developments, and then applied
it to assess the potential future ecological consequences of human
activities. Based on its study, the committee came to four key
conclusions:
1. The conceptual model for futures analysis, which combines the
use of scenarios and the analytical framework for ecological risk
assessment (ecorisk framework), provided a formalized
approach for assessing future environmental risks.
2. This approach, when applied to two scenarios making differing
assumptions about future energy costs, revealed possible
ecological consequences that probably would not have been
determined through an unstructured brainstorming.
3. Attempting to identify the ecological consequences of the two
different energy scenarios demonstrated to the committee that
the value of examining futures lies in the process rather than
the results of that examination.
4. The committee's scenarios/futures analysis reaffirmed the
conclusions in Reducing Risk that national ecological risks are
dominated by larger-scale and longer-time issues, including
global climate change and habitat alteration, ozone depletion,
and the introduction of exotic species.
Report of the Environmental
Engineering Committee (EPA-SAB-EEC-
95-004)
The Environmental Engineering Committee chose to study four
technology-related issues that may emerge in the future: 1) fostering
environmental protection while helping to assure sustained industrial
development in an increasingly competitive manufacturing
economy; 2) responding to increasing societal pressures for the
redevelopment of industrial sites and remediation of land'
3) preparing to address threats posed to human health and natural
resources by transient phenomena; and 4) correcting insufficiencies
in core technical competencies that are needed to address future
environmental challenges.
Using a look-out panel, the committee identified eight additional
issues that EPA should consider evaluating: 1) fossil fuel depletion;
2) industrial accidents and/or terrorist activities; 3) deterioration of
urban infrastructure; 4) low-cost benefits of some environmental
management strategies; 5) reservoirs of environmental
contaminants; 6) pathogens in drinking water; 7) electromagnetic
radiation; and 8) industrial ecology.
Based upon its study, the committee prepared four
recommendations for EPA:
1. EPA policy recommendations concerning clean technologies
should be constructed and balanced carefully, to benefit both
the environment and U.S. industrial competitiveness.
2. EPA should ensure the development and use of appropriate
technology to enable the redevelopment of contaminated urban
industrial sites and remediated land.
3. EPA should strengthen its capabilities and readiness to address
potential environmental consequences of natural disasters
associated with transient events such as river floods and violent
regional storms especially considering trends in population
growth and land use.
4. EPA should systematically identify and examine the essential
and distinct scientific and engineering capabilities (core
competencies) needed to address technical aspects of its
present and anticipated future mission, and then strengthen them
where needed.
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Report of the Indoor Air Quality and
Total Human Exposure Committee
(EPA-SAB-IAQ-95-005)
The Indoor Air Quality and Total Human Exposure Committee
studied opportunities for advances in the science and art of human
exposure assessment, and the opportunities that such advances
could offer EPA and the nation for improving risk assessment and
management. The committee recognized that significant advances
could be made in three critical areas:
. Microsensor and microprocessor technologies;
. Biomarkers of exposure; and
. Database resources.
Based upon its study, the committee prepared five specific
recommendations to EPA:
1. Develop a mechanism to support the research, validation, and
application of: a) more sensitive and specific microsensors,
biomarkers, and other monitoring technologies and approaches
for measuring exposures; and b) validated data on associated
exposure determinants, including demographic characteristics,
time-activity patterns, locations of activities, and behavioral and
lifestyle factors.
2. Establish a mechanism to develop, validate with field data, and
iteratively improve models that integrate: a) measurements of
total exposure and their determinants; b) a better knowledge of
exposure distributions across different populations; and c) the
most current understanding of exposure-dose relationships.
3. Develop, in cooperation with other agencies and stakeholders,
a robust database that reflects the status and trends in national
exposure to environmental contaminants.
4. Develop sustained mechanisms and incentives to ensure a
greater degree of interdisciplinary collaboration in exposure
assessment and, by extension, in risk assessment and risk
management activities.
5. Take advantage of improving capabilities in exposure
assessment technology, electronic handling of data, and
electronic communications to establish and disseminate early
warnings of emerging environmental stressors.
Report of the Radiation Advisory
Committee (EPA-SAB-RAC-95-006)
The Radiation Advisory Committee (RAC) formed the Radiation
Environmental Futures Subcommittee to assess future potential
problems in environmental radiation. The subcommittee scanned
potential future developments in the field of radiation, particularly
as they pertained to environmental radiation. Based on its study,
the subcommittee recommended that EPA consider the following
activities:
1. Place greater emphasis on providing scientifically credible
information, while relying less on a regulatory role in risk
management.
2. Participate in the joint development of national energy policies,
focusing on the overall environmental consequences of different
energy production options, the roles of alternative energy sources-
including nuclear electricity generation-in curtailing greenhouse
gases, potential releases of radioactive materials to the
environment, radioactive waste management issues, and possible
increases in ultraviolet radiation.
3. Incorporate into its program activities research findings related to
radiation exposures, dose-response models, and radiation effects,
especially in regard to differences in individual susceptibility.
4. Provide an environmental perspective to assure control of nuclear
weapons materials through conversion to energy use and/or secure
disposal.
5. Stimulate and track research on the potential health effects of
exposure to non-ionizing radiation, and provide non-regulatory
Federal guidance and advice on the prudent avoidance of
unnecessary risks from potential sources of exposure, if such risks
are shown to exist.
6. Provide Federal leadership in activities involving pollution
prevention, the management and disposal of radioactive wastes,
and development of criteria and standards for cleanup of sites
containing radioactive and mixed wastes.
7. Exercise its Federal radiation guidance role, in collaboration with
other Federal and state agencies, to reduce human exposure during
medical uses of radiation.
8. Continue efforts to characterize potentially high-risk radon regions,
improve knowledge about radon risks, and develop more accurate
methods of measuring and mitigating radon in buildings.
9. Become the primary source of information on environmental
radiation by providing advice, and guidance where appropriate, on
the scientific basis for risk management decisions and by identifying
research needs in radiation-related areas.
10 Use a process of foresight to develop a capability for scanning the
future in order to be proactive, rather than reactive, in shaping
environmental radiation policies.
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The technical annex to this report, Futures Methods and issues
(EPA-SAB-EC-95-007A), provides detailed background material
prepared by the Environmental Futures Committee of the SAB.
To receive a copy, contact:
Committee Evaluation and Support Staff
Science Advisory Board
401 M St., S. W. (Mail Stop 1400)
Washington, D.C. 20460
(202) 260-8414
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