Enforcement and Compliance
EPA’s Criminal Prosecution and Punishment of Environmental Crimes
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has the difficult mission of crafting complex environmental rules and regulations while considering the economic costs of those actions. The Agency must also engage in law enforcement...
“Running on Fumes”: The Development of New EPA Regulations in an Era of Scarcity
EPA’s operating budgets and staff size are at historically low levels, and the volume of its facility inspections and civil enforcement cases has dropped. The enforcement resources available to state environmental agencies have also...
Internal Investigations of Environmental Crimes
The initiation of a government environmental criminal investigation or discovery of a serious compliance issue often triggers the need to conduct an internal investigation. The decision to conduct an internal investigation entails...
Next Generation Compliance
This Article is adapted from Chapter One of Next Generation Environmental Compliance and Enforcement (LeRoy C. Paddock and Jessica A. Wentz eds.) published in 2014 by ELI Press. The book emerged from a two-day EPA workshop...
Measuring Environmental Enforcement Success: The Elusive Search for Objectivity
How best to measure the effectiveness of environmental enforcement is a long-standing question. Recently, EPA stirred renewed interest in how to measure enforcement success. Its Draft FY 2014-2018 Strategic Plan suggested a new...
Beyond Deterrence: Compliance and Enforcement in the Context of Sustainable Development
Regulation is the most direct and predictable mechanism for controlling environmental behavior. Strong compliance and enforcement programs that punish violators and deter violations by others are, of course, essential to any successful...
One Hundred Years of the Environment and Natural Resources Division
On November 16, 2009, hundreds of current and former attorneys, staff members, and friends gathered in Washington, D.C., to celebrate the 100th Anniversary of the Environment and Natural Resources Division (ENRD or the Division) at the...
Quality Assurance in EHS Audits and Audit Programs: The New BEAC Standards
How does a chief executive officer (CEO) know when he or she certifies to the accuracy and completeness of the company's annual report, filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), that all of the company's...
A Fresh Start for EPA Enforcement
Editor's Summary: EPA's enforcement effort is starting to recover after a recent ebb in activity. In this Article, Eric Schaeffer examines how appointees under the next Administration can take advantage of the new momentum to build an...
Some Thoughts on the Interdisciplinary Aspects of Environmental Enforcement
Editor's Summary: A multitude of parties are involved in the enforcement of environmental laws. While attorneys, scientists, investigators, and other trained professionals working at the federal, state, and local level are all necessary...