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98
costs are very high and the political risk of “hot spots” is not acceptable. Thompson
(2000) indicates that RECLAIM faces numerous technical and regulatory uncertainties
and a lot of political obstacles during the implementation process, such as the
overwhelming impacts of businesses.
Lobbying is also intense during the design and implementation of RECLAIM.
As a special-purpose government, SCAQMD may have more leverage to reduce the
influence by external lobbying. In fact, SCAQMD was very ambitious and successful
in designing and implementing various policies/programs to improve air quality in the
Los Angeles air basin during the 1970s and 1980s. However, in the early 1990s
SCAQMD still faced the difficulty of using command-and-control instruments to
achieve the emission reduction goal mandated by the federal CAAA. It was under this
circumstance that SCAQMD adopted a cap-and-trade emissions trading system, and it
had to promise to avoid deadlocks or political and administrative resistances.
5.2.2 Rules of RECLAIM
RECLAIM rules manage allocation of permits, new resource review,
mechanisms of trading, monitoring, and recording; and plans of compliance and
sanction.19 In the RECLAIM program, the trading permit is called “RECLAIM Trade
Credits” (RTCs). They were originally allocated to industrial participants in 1994 and
then used and traded by these participants, with the total cap of RTCs decreasing year
by year. Yet the implementation rules of RECLAIM are more complex than a simple
19 Details of the RECLAIM rules are available at the SCAQMD website:
http://www.aqmd.gov/rules/reg/reg20_tofc.html.
Object Description
| Title | Processes, effects, and the implementation of market-based environmental policy: southern California's experiences with emissions trading |
| Author | Zhan, Xueyong |
| Author email | xzhan@usc.edu; xueyongzhan@gmail.com |
| Degree | Doctor of Philosophy |
| Document type | Dissertation |
| Degree program | Public Administration |
| School | School of Policy, Planning, and Development |
| Date defended/completed | 2008-07-01 |
| Date submitted | 2008 |
| Restricted until | Unrestricted |
| Date published | 2008-10-30 |
| Advisor (committee chair) | Tang, Shui-Yan |
| Advisor (committee member) |
Mazmanian, Daniel A. Henry, Ronald |
| Abstract | This research provides a positive explanation of the implementation processes and effects of market-based environmental policy by conducting a case study on RECLAIM (Regional Clean Air Incentives Market), the first regional emission permits trading program that has been implemented by South Coast Air Quality Management District (SCAQMD) to address air pollution problems in the Los Angeles air basin since 1994.; Firstly, I developed a game theoretic model of environmental policy implementation. This model integrates theories of administrative rulemaking, policy implementation, institutional rational choice and transaction cost politics. I argue that administrative agency tries to minimize political transaction costs of policy implementation when writing rules.; Based on the formal model, I conducted a quantitative analysis to examine the interactions between SCAQMD and its key stakeholders, such as federal, state and local governments, businesses, and environmental NGOs, during the rulemaking of RECLAIM. I found that SCAQMD is more likely to adopt rule changes suggested by state and federal environmental agencies. This research identifies the dominant role of organized interest groups, the existence of interagency lobbying, and the lack of citizen control over the rulemaking of RECLAIM. Furthermore, I conducted an evaluation of the rules governing the RECLAIM program, and I identify the major distortions of the RECLAIM rules in comparison with an ideal cap-and-trade emissions trading market. Also, I used OLS regression to examine the effects of policy difference on emission level in California between 1990 and 1999. This evaluation fails to reject the null hypothesis that using cap-and-trade (CAT) compared with using command-and-control (CAC) has no different effects on emission of both NOx and SO2 from point sources at the county level in California in the 1990's.; In summary, this research finds that the implementation of emissions trading is political, and interest group politics may distort the regulatory design and implementation of an emissions trading program. While cap-and-trade is promising to better protect our environment and natural resources, its implementation is conditioned by many political and administrative factors. Inadequate rules may come as the results of political compromises, and they may impact the functioning of an emissions trading system. |
| Keyword | emissions trading; rulemaking; RECLAIM; implementation; environmental governance |
| Geographic subject (city or populated place) | Los Angeles |
| Geographic subject (state) | California |
| Coverage date | 1990/2000 |
| Language | English |
| Part of collection | University of Southern California dissertations and theses |
| Publisher (of the original version) | University of Southern California |
| Place of publication (of the original version) | Los Angeles, California |
| Publisher (of the digital version) | University of Southern California. Libraries |
| Provenance | Electronically uploaded by the author |
| Type | texts |
| Legacy record ID | usctheses-m1719 |
| Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
| Rights | Zhan, Xueyong |
| Repository name | Libraries, University of Southern California |
| Repository address | Los Angeles, California |
| Repository email | cisadmin@lib.usc.edu |
| Filename | etd-Zhan-2335 |
| Archival file | uscthesesreloadpub_Volume44/etd-Zhan-2335.pdf |
Description
| Title | Page 109 |
| Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
| Repository email | cisadmin@lib.usc.edu |
| Full text | 98 costs are very high and the political risk of “hot spots” is not acceptable. Thompson (2000) indicates that RECLAIM faces numerous technical and regulatory uncertainties and a lot of political obstacles during the implementation process, such as the overwhelming impacts of businesses. Lobbying is also intense during the design and implementation of RECLAIM. As a special-purpose government, SCAQMD may have more leverage to reduce the influence by external lobbying. In fact, SCAQMD was very ambitious and successful in designing and implementing various policies/programs to improve air quality in the Los Angeles air basin during the 1970s and 1980s. However, in the early 1990s SCAQMD still faced the difficulty of using command-and-control instruments to achieve the emission reduction goal mandated by the federal CAAA. It was under this circumstance that SCAQMD adopted a cap-and-trade emissions trading system, and it had to promise to avoid deadlocks or political and administrative resistances. 5.2.2 Rules of RECLAIM RECLAIM rules manage allocation of permits, new resource review, mechanisms of trading, monitoring, and recording; and plans of compliance and sanction.19 In the RECLAIM program, the trading permit is called “RECLAIM Trade Credits” (RTCs). They were originally allocated to industrial participants in 1994 and then used and traded by these participants, with the total cap of RTCs decreasing year by year. Yet the implementation rules of RECLAIM are more complex than a simple 19 Details of the RECLAIM rules are available at the SCAQMD website: http://www.aqmd.gov/rules/reg/reg20_tofc.html. |
