ECONOMIC-IMPACT ANALYSES IN UNITED-STATES STATE AND LOCAL AIR-POLLUTION CONTROL AGENCIES - A SURVEY

Clean air is essential to our health and well-being. In this paper, we describe the scope and methods of economic impact analyses that are currently being conducted by state agencies in the U.S. and local air pollution control agencies in California. We also attempt to define the state-of-the-art and suggest future potential directions of air pollution economic impact analyses. In our survey we found that many of these agencies either do not undertake any significant economic analysis, or they engage in analysis that is incomplete relative to what is technically available. There are large potentials for improving economic impact analyses in all agencies. We believe that the greatest gain will come from two areas: (1) asking the right questions, and (2) adopting a flexible method of analysis to match tools to changing analytical needs.