This summary also is the first chapter of Ohio's State of the Environment Report . It provides an overview of comparative risk, discusses the genesis of the Ohio Comparative Risk Project, and explains the methodology used in ranking environmental risks in Ohio. Although this summary offers brief desrciptions of some of the environmental conditions evaluated in the Ohio Comparative Risk Project, the State of the Environment Report offers a more complete picture of environmental conditions in the state.
What is Comparative Risk?
Comparative risk is a planning process that endeavors to analyze and assess the risks from environmental issues and ultimately rank the issues on the basis of the risks they pose. Comparative risk is based on the premise that there are limited resources to deal with all of the environmental problems we face; therefore, we need to focus those resources in a manner that will result in the greatest overall reduction of risk. The risks must be identified using science and public values, not one or the other, and the process of comparative risk is set up to do this. Without comparative risk or some similar tool to bring available information into the environmental management arena, we may continue to respond to the environmental crisis of the day--syringes washed up on the shore, newly discovered hazardous waste sites, or the reporting of a new toxic hazard.
The United States Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) conducted the first comparative risk project in 1987 in the study known as Unfinished Business. Unfinished Business was a scientific study of environmental issues that have national importance. A subsequent comparison of public perception to U.S. EPA's scientific assessment confirmed that there is a gap between the two. For instance, in a national survey, the public perceived chemical waste disposal as the number one issue of concern, whereas the U.S. EPA team ranked it sixteenth (out of 31 issues). Radon was considered to be one of the top issues by U.S. EPA, but the public did not identify this as important. Comparative risk seeks to bridge the gap between the public and scientific community by providing an avenue of convergence.
Since the Unfinished Business study was completed, U.S. EPA regional offices have conducted their own studies and seven states have also recently completed studies. What is becoming increasingly clear is that there are not only regional differences in environmental priorities, but these differences extend to states as well. As local entities across the country begin projects of their own, the differences at the local level also will become evident.
Because comparative risk uses values which are important to the public and understandable to a wide range of decisionmakers, it is a planning technique that has the potential to address many environmental issues simultaneously.
As part of its public outreach, the Public Advisory Group asked the public whether they agreed with the premise of limited environmental resources. In a random telephone survey of 900 Ohioans in June 1995, one of the initial questions asked respondents to identify which of the following statements came closest to his or her view:
A. We do not have enough money to deal with all of the environmental problems Ohio faces, so we must decide which environmental problems we should focus on; OR
B. If we spend our money wisely and enforce environmental standards, Ohio can meet nearly all of the environmental risks we face; OR
C. We are already spending more money and enforcing more standards than we need to in order to deal with environmental problems Ohio faces; OR
D. I'm not sure about this.
Statement B was selected by 58 percent of the respondents, more than double the number (24%) who chose statement A, suggesting that the premise of limited resources is not self-evident.
However, later in the survey, after being asked for their views on the range of environmental problems being considered by the Ohio Comparative Risk Project, respondents were again asked whether it was necessary to prioritize resources. The adjacent figure compares the responses.
Ohio's Project
In April 1993, Ohio EPA submitted a proposal to U.S. EPA to fund a comparative risk project in the state. The proposal was developed by a group of Ohio EPA staff during a series of planning meetings beginning in November 1992. Subsequently U.S. EPA offered Ohio EPA a $100,000 grant, which was matched by the Ohio General Assembly, to coordinate the project; groundwork for the project began in November 1993.
On March 30, 1994, Governor George V. Voinovich signed Executive Order 94-48V establishing the Ohio Comparative Risk Project; the text of the Executive Order is found in Box 1. On this same day, a Kickoff Event was held in Columbus with approximately 200 participants. The purpose of the kickoff event was to orient interested individuals and potential volunteers to the concepts of comparative risk and to begin generating ideas about important environmental issues in Ohio. Part of the day was spent brainstorming environmental issues that should possibly be evaluated in the course of the project. The participants at the event generated a list of more than 700 potential issues.
Ohio's project was designed with two general components: a technical assessment of risks and a public outreach element.
(*The name was eventually changed to the "State Agency Advisory Group" to better reflect its responsibilities.)
Individuals who were interested in volunteering for technical workgroups or the Public Advisory Group submitted applications to Ohio EPA. The applications were more for organization than selection, since no one was excluded from participating. The result was three technical groups responsible for assessing human health, ecological, and quality-of-life risks and one Public Advisory Group (PAG), responsible for coordinating public outreach and ultimately ranking the risks. Throughout the period before and after formation of the PAG and the technical workgroups, representatives of Ohio's environmental community and others were kept advised of the status of the project. Project staff used several mailings as well as public meetings and forums to encourage participation.
The list of environmental threats compiled at the Kickoff Event was the starting point for developing the project's working list of issues. All three technical groups worked with the 700+ issue list to reduce redundancies and to identify a manageable group of key issues that could be adequately addressed by the project's volunteers within the available time. On August 18, 1994, the chairs of the three technical groups and the PAG met to negotiate a working list of environmental issues that would serve as a basis for the technical workgroups' research efforts and, ultimately, for the PAG's risk ranking efforts. In order to organize the research for the project, the negotiating team developed the following 11 general problem categories:
Each of the 11 problem categories contains several potential threats. For example, mobile source emissions are a potential threat categorized in the outdoor air quality problem category. Abandoned industrial sites are a potential threat in the land use and development problem category, and tire management is a potential threat in the waste management category.
While the issues list was extensive, it was impossible for this volunteer effort to include every issue of environmental concern to Ohioans. Moreover, project participants recognized that the list represented, at best, a "snapshot" of concerns that were constantly shifting and changing due to developments in Ohio. For instance, in the months after the working list of issues was established, radioactive waste handling--an issue identified as a component of waste management but not included as one of the specific threats on the ranking list--became an issue of much greater public interest. During this time, the Ohio General Assembly considered legislation on the siting of a low-level radioactive waste storage facility in Ohio. Just as the mere inclusion of an issue on the working list should not be interpreted as an indication that the issue presents a significant risk to Ohioans, the absence of an issue from the list should not be interpreted as an indication that the issue is of no concern.
In assessing ecosystem risks and human health risks, the technical workgroups characterized the risks associated with the potential threats rather than the broader problem categories. The quality-of-life group, for reasons which will be explained later, characterized risks associated with each general problem category. The PAG ultimately ranked 45 potential threats in nine problem categories. Two problem categories--environmental management, and environmental awareness and access to information--were addressed as overarching issues that affect the severity of various threats, but were not included as independent threats in the risk ranking.