76 pages AEI Press and Pacific Research Institute Publication Date: April 2003 Paperback ISBN: None

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April 2003
Index of Leading Environmental Indicators 2003
By Steven F. Hayward with Ryan Stowers

Contrary to the public's perception of negative environmental trends, little-noticed government data suggest considerable progress in recent decades. The eighth edition of the Index of Leading Environmental Indicators, which includes a new section of media criticism, examines notable factors in this progress, including expanding forests and improved air and water quality.

In addition to being the author of the annual Index, Steven F. Hayward, F. K. Weyerhaeuser Fellow at AEI and senior fellow at the Pacific Research Institute, is the author of The Age of Reagan (2001) and of AEI's monthly Environmental Policy Outlook. Ryan Stowers is an AEI research assistant.

The Index of Leading Environmental Indicators, now copublished by AEI and the Pacific Research Institute, is an annual report on environmental trends and controversies in the United States. The Index analyzes and summarizes overlooked government data on the environment, most of which demonstrates substantial environmental progress over the last generation.

The Index has broadened its scope in recent editions to offer a retrospective on the major environmental issues of the previous year. The biggest story of 2002 was undoubtedly the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg in August and September. The Index notes that the summit took a different course than anticipated and may represent a turning point for environmental policy. The emphasis on economic growth as a prerequisite for environmental progress represented a dramatic repudiation of the Malthusian mindset that characterized past UN environmental conclaves--a fact that was not lost on some left leaning environmental organizations that were furious about the outcome.

The Index also reviews the continuing fallout from the American decision not to participate in the Kyoto framework and public opinion trends about environmental issues. Despite the conventional wisdom that President George W. Bush's environmental policies are unpopular, opinion polls over the last several months give him surprisingly high marks on the environment--evidence, perhaps, that the public is filtering out the frothier pronouncements of the more politicized environmental groups.

As with previous editions, the 2003 Index highlights notable recent scholarship and research that may have been overlooked in the media. A new feature of the Index is a media critique section that identifies weaknesses in media coverage of environmental issues, as well as a "top ten" list of the best environmental reporting and commentary from the previous year. The media critique will be a regular feature of future editions of the Index.

Forests

Each year the Index devotes a special section to a closer look at a prominent environmental issue. This year's special section examines the conditions and trends in America's forests. The Forest Service is in the process of completing a major report on sustainable forestry, and a late draft version offers new data shedding light on forest trends. The Forest Service notes the need for authoritative data on forest conditions:

Surveys have also indicated that Americans often have misperceptions about the current status and trends for forests in the U.S. For example, many think our forests are declining in extent, while in reality the total area of forests nationally has been fairly stable since about 1920 and actually increased slightly between 1990 and 2002. Also, many think we are harvesting more trees than we are growing, while in reality net growth in U.S. forests exceeds removals by a large margin.

One reason forests have increased, especially in the eastern half of the nation, is ironically rooted in a cause often lamented--the decline of farmland. Much northeastern farmland that was cleared from forests 200 years ago has been abandoned and is reverting back to forest. By 2001, according to the Forest Service, about 2 million acres a year were being planted with trees, which is an area larger than the amount of land urbanized each year through urban sprawl. The Forest Service adds: "If net growth on timberland compared with removals is acceptable as a measure of sustainable removal of wood products, then removals of wood products in the U.S. are currently sustainable." (See figure 1.)

 

Figure 1: Forest Growth and Removal (Source: U.S. Forest Service)

The large fires of summer 2002 have given new salience to the issue of forest conditions. (See figure 2.) The Forest Service estimates that as many as 190 million acres of public land, mostly in the west, are at increased risk of catastrophic fire because of overgrown conditions. How to manage these lands is the source of much political wrangling, and it is likely to remain that way unless the federal government relaxes its iron grip on the local management of these lands.

As the Forest Service has admitted, "There will likely always be debate about how this management relates to protection and maintenance of biological diversity." Of course, this really comes down to a matter of property rights. On private lands, more aggressive thinning and management practices can proceed without legal and bureaucratic interference and as a result are managed in a more sustainable manner.

Figure 2: Forest Area Burned in Western Wildfires (Source: U.S. Forest Service)

Air Pollution, Water, and Toxic Chemicals

The Index includes yearly updates on trend data for three key areas: air pollution, water, and toxic chemicals.

Air Pollution. Polls consistently find that Americans believe air quality has gotten worse and will continue to get worse in the future. It is only when the entire record of the last three decades is surveyed that the dramatic progress becomes evident. The Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) preliminary report on air quality for 2001 notes that, since 1970, aggregate emissions of the six major pollutants declined 25 percent, while the U.S. economy grew 161 percent, auto travel increased by 149 percent, and total U.S. energy consumption (the primary source of air pollution emissions) expanded by 42 percent. While aggregate emissions of the "precursors" of pollution have fallen by 25 percent, ambient levels of pollution--the actual concentrations of pollution in the air that we breathe--have fallen more. Table 1 records the changes in the six "criteria" pollutants regulated under the Clean Air Act, and figure 3 shows the decline in the number of "exceedences" of the air quality index threshold for unhealthy air in California, the state with the worst smog levels.

The air quality section also contains a discussion of why we can expect continued improvement in air quality and an analysis of the controversy over "new source review" and the Bush administration's related "clear skies" proposal.

Table 1: Changes in Ambient Air Pollution Levels in the United States 

	1976-2001	2001
Ozone	-32.9%	2.0%
Sulfur Dioxides	-67.0%	-2.9%
Nitrogen Dioxide	-41.7%	-0.6%
Carbon Monoxide	-72.0%	-4.4%
Particulates (PM10)	-27.0%*	1.2%
Lead	-97.0%	12.5%

(*1988-2001)

Water. Systematic measurement of water quality remains elusive. Only 19 percent of river and stream miles were assessed in the EPA's most recent National Water Quality Inventory, and there is no way to extrapolate from this sample about the condition of the remaining 81 percent. It is also difficult to compare data from one state to another because those states may well use different indicators to assess the attainment of standards or even may have different standards altogether.

Figure 3: Air Quality Index 'Exceedences' in California (Source: EPA)

Nevertheless, it is clear that water quality has improved in the last thirty years. And while the change nationwide has not been dramatic, local success stories often demonstrate substantial improvements. One of the more significant findings from the EPA's most recent report on children and the environment is that the percentage of children exposed to unsafe water declined from 20 percent in 1993 to just 8 percent in 1999--a 60 percent decline. (See figure 4.)

Figure 4: Percentage of Children Living in Areas Served by Public Water Systems That Exceed a Drinking Water Standard or Violate Treatment Requirements (Source: EPA)

Toxics. Trends in the output of toxic chemicals are based on the EPA's Toxics Release Inventory, a reporting system for more than 650 chemicals. While the total output of the industries covered under the TRI has increased 40 percent since 1991, the level of toxic releases has declined 51.2 percent since 1988.  The reduction in the use of chemicals, even as industrial output and economic activity grow, is a sign of the increasing efficiency of our industrial plants and the "dematerialization" of the economy.

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