Should EPA Science Reports Be More Transparent And Publicly Available? (H.R. 1030)

What is H.R. 1030?

(Updated February 28, 2018)

This bill would prohibit the EPA from proposing, finalizing, disseminating regulations, or assessments based on science that is not transparent or reproducible.

All scientific and technical information relied upon to support regulations must be specifically identified. It must also be made publicly available in a way that it is suitable for independent analysis and reproduction of research results.

Other covered actions would include a risk, exposure, or hazard assessment, criteria document, standard, limitation, regulation, regulatory impact analysis, or guidance.

Argument in favor

This bill would make EPA operations more transparent, especially around how they create regulations. It seems obvious that the EPA should be making its scientific studies publicly available.

Argument opposed

The requirements put forth by this bill could be very costly if the EPA tries to use the same number of scientific studies that it has in the past. If it doesn’t, the quality of its work in protecting the environment may be undermined.

Impact

Scientific entities contracted for research studies by the EPA, the subjects of those research studies, EPA employees, and the EPA.

Cost of H.R. 1030

A CBO cost estimate is unavailable. However, a CBO estimate of a previous version of this bill found that the bill would cost about $250 million annually for the next few years, with costs declining gradually from that level thereafter. The CBO does, however, admit that there is a very high degree of uncertainty, and the $250 million estimate represents the middle of a wide range of outcomes.

Additional Info

In Depth:

Currently, the EPA spends about $500 million annually on research and risk assessments. It relies on a variable number of studies to produce regulations depending on the subject, so it could use ten studies for one regulation, and thousands of studies for another. The EPA uses about 50,000 scientific studies every year.

EPA studies come in many different sizes and configurations, and this typically has to do with the subject of the scientific study. The previous CBO analysis of this bill cited two radically different examples to demonstrate this — a regulation on flaring at petroleum refineries that used 12 studies, and an air quality regulation that required thousands of studies.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) also notes that longitudinal studies  — which can be very extensive and last for years, if not decades — would be impractical to replicate. Another concern expressed by the AAAS is that research gained from one-off events like the Deepwater Horizon Gulf Oil Spill would be unusable for regulations because it wouldn’t be replicable. It is unclear whether exceptions for these circumstances could be arranged.

The types of studies the EPA would have to use based on this legislation typically cost between $10,000 and $30,000 for each scientific study. If the EPA uses the same number of studies as it has in the past while increasing its dissemination of technical information, this bill will cost at least $250 million per year, if not much more.

On the other hand, the EPA could rely on fewer studies every year, focusing on those studies that are easily accessible and more transparent. Doing so would allow it to limit its spending on data collection and database construction, lowering the projected cost.

On balance, the CBO believes the EPA would probably reduce the number of studies it relies on by half. It will also likely limit its spending on data collection, database construction, and dissemination — but the increases in spending will largely be driven by those activities.

Media:

Committee on Science, Space, and Technology — Sponsoring Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) Statement

CBO Estimate (Previous Bill Version)

Bloomberg (Previous Bill Version)

American Alliance for Innovation (In Favor) (Previous Bill Version)

U.S. Chamber of Commerce (In Favor) (Previous Bill Version)

American Association for the Advancement of Science (Opposed) (Previous Bill Version)

Think Progress (Opposed) (Previous Bill Version)

(Photo Credit: Flickr user x-ray delta one)