Analyzing Superfund

Analyzing Superfund brings together some of the most important theoretical and empirical work from the research community on four issues central to the evaluation of Superfund: cleanup standards, the liability regime, transaction costs, and natural resource damages.

Three empirical studies examine the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's cleanup decisions, paying particular regard to the role of cost-benefit considerations. Liability issues are assessed in two chapters, one a theoretical analysis of the relative merits of joint-and-several liability as compared with nonjoint liability, the other an examination of the likely financial impact of three alternative liability schemes upon various sectors of the national economy.

One chapter summarizes and analyzes empirical research conducted by RAND on Superfund transaction costs; a second chapter explores EPA's use of de minimis settlements - a legal arrangement for achieving quick settlement with parties responsible for only a small share of the liability at a given site.

The final chapter of Analyzing Superfund presents one view of significant conceptual, legal, and practical difficulties with the natural resources damages regime, which is portrayed as a novel blend of tort liability, public trust, and administrative models.

According to this view, problems of high transaction costs, wasteful expenditures of recoveries, and severe difficulties in developing an appropriate measure of damages could well offset legislative progress made at reducing the cost of the Superfund scheme, thereby generating demands for change analogous to those found in the reauthorization debate concerning liability for cleanups.