Scholarship

This project, funded by a three-year grant from the National Science Foundation, builds a framework for understanding the effects of environmental information disclosure on community and corporate decision making. 

Coming clean: information Disclosure and Environmental Decision Making

This paper presents a case study of Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) air pollution exposure risks across metropolitan St. Louis.  The analysis of TRIs across metropolitan St. Louis shows that minority and low-income residents were disproportionately closer to industrial pollution sources at nonrandom significance levels. Spatial concentrations of minority residents averaged nearly 40% within one kilometer of St. Louis TRI sites compared to 25% elsewhere. However, one-fifth of the region’s air pollution exposure risk over a decade was spatially concentrated among only six facilities on the southwestern border of East St. Louis. This disproportionate concentration of some of the greatest pollution risk would never be considered in most conventional environmental justice analyses. Not all pollution exposure risk is average, and the worst industrial risks deserve more attention from environmental managers assessing and mitigating environmental injustices.

This fall 2007 publication explores factors that may explain why some states host greater concentrations of manufacturers reducing pollution and risk.  The conclusion is that the driving mechanism for industrial environmental performance may be the anticipatory actions of businesses attempting to preempt regulatory pressure, especially in policy progressive states.

Unequal Pollution and Skewed Riskscapes: Environmental Injustice across Metropolitan St. Louis

Environmental information disclosure and risk reduction among the states.

In this 2000 publication co-authored with Mark Stephan, we use a combination of case studies and interviews to critique a growing literature that optimistically associates the devolution of environmental policy making with citizen participation.  Click on the image for more details.

The Limits of Civic Environmentalism

In this 2004 publication co-authored with former graduate student Alex Vasiliev, we explored a set of methods and tools to show how the analysis of environmental injustice in an urban area could focus on the worst polluters first while also facilitating more involvement for community stakeholders in the risk analysis process.  Environmental justice (EJ) is “the fair treatment of and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies” according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Click on the image for more.