It was soon realised by the US authorities that offset policies were not enough to reduce pollution to acceptable standards; additional 'bubble policies' were introduced to deal with established industries. Such policies also started off by being applied to individual companies. An imaginary bubble with a single opening is placed over an industrial complex which actually has more than one point of discharge. This means that the stacks are not regulated individually, but standards are set for the total emissions of the whole complex. In this way, the company can meet the standards by reducing the emissions from those of its operations where it can be done cheaply and leaving other operations with above-standard emissions. The concentrations and volumes of emissions from the various operations are then averaged, and it is this average that must meet the standard. The regulator does not have to negotiate what pollution control equipment should be installed at each outlet point. This is left up to each company to decide. Bubbles are now used in NSW for water pollution as can be seen by following the links above.  |
||||
