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The impact of monitoring and enforcement on air pollutant emissions

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  • Jinghui Lim

    (University of California, Los Angeles)

Abstract

Monitoring and enforcement are an important part of any regulatory regime, and the costs of such regulatory actions should be justified by improvements in environmental performance. Among air pollutants, particulate matter has the greatest health impacts: the EPA estimates that reductions in ambient particulate matter will have prevented 195,500 cases of premature mortality by 2020. This article is the first to study the impact of monitoring and enforcement actions on emissions of criteria pollutants, which are commonly found air pollutants such as ozone and particulate matter. Previous research on criteria pollutants has been limited as data are not easily available. This article studies both specific and general deterrence. It shows that penalties produce a small but statistically significant specific deterrence impact and inspections produce a general deterrence impact: increasing the average number of inspections at other facilities in the same county by one decreases emissions by 2.7 %.

Suggested Citation

  • Jinghui Lim, 2016. "The impact of monitoring and enforcement on air pollutant emissions," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 49(2), pages 203-222, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:regeco:v:49:y:2016:i:2:d:10.1007_s11149-016-9293-7
    DOI: 10.1007/s11149-016-9293-7
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Choy, Stacey & Jiang, Shushu & Liao, Scott & Wang, Emma, 2024. "Public environmental enforcement and private lender monitoring: Evidence from environmental covenants," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(2).
    2. Zach Raff & Jason M. Walter, 2020. "Regulatory Avoidance and Spillover: The Effects of Environmental Regulation on Emissions at Coal-Fired Power Plants," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 75(3), pages 387-420, March.
    3. Sjöberg, Eric & Xu, Jing, 2018. "An Empirical Study of US Environmental Federalism: RCRA Enforcement From 1998 to 2011," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 147(C), pages 253-263.
    4. Walter, Jason & Raff, Zach, 2019. "When the regulator goes home: The effectiveness of environmental oversight," MPRA Paper 94158, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Xiang Bi, 2017. "“Cleansing the air at the expense of waterways?” Empirical evidence from the toxic releases of coal-fired power plants in the United States," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 51(1), pages 18-40, February.
    6. Tihitina Andarge & Erik Lichtenberg, 2020. "Regulatory compliance under enforcement gaps," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 57(3), pages 181-202, June.
    7. Chunhua Xin & Xiaolu Hao & Lu Cheng, 2022. "Do Environmental Administrative Penalties Affect Audit Fees? Results from Multiple Econometric Models," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(7), pages 1-25, April.
    8. Torkayesh, Ali Ebadi & Alizadeh, Reza & Soltanisehat, Leili & Torkayesh, Sajjad Ebadi & Lund, Peter D., 2022. "A comparative assessment of air quality across European countries using an integrated decision support model," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    9. Sam, Abdoul G. & Zhang, Xiaodong, 2020. "Value relevance of the new environmental enforcement regime in China," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    10. Gupta, Shreekant & Saksena, Shalini & Baris, Omer F., 2019. "Environmental enforcement and compliance in developing countries: Evidence from India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 313-327.
    11. Calel, Raphael & Dechezlepretre, Antoine & Venmans, Frank, 2023. "Policing carbon markets," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 120565, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    12. Thomas J. Miceli & Kathleen Segerson & Dietrich Earnhart, 2022. "The role of experience in deterring crime: A theory of specific versus general deterrence," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 60(4), pages 1833-1853, October.
    13. Lirong Liu & Zhou Yang, 2020. "Leveraged enforcement under the EPA’s High Priority Violation Policy," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 58(3), pages 1279-1304, March.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Monitoring; Enforcement; Penalties; Deterrence; Air pollution;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • K32 - Law and Economics - - Other Substantive Areas of Law - - - Energy, Environmental, Health, and Safety Law
    • K42 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law
    • Q53 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Air Pollution; Water Pollution; Noise; Hazardous Waste; Solid Waste; Recycling

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