Evaluating the Social Effects of Performance-Based Environmental Programs

Abstract

Over the past decade, the U.S. EPA and some 20 states have developed Performance-Based Environmental Programs (PBEPs) that offer recognition and limited regulatory flexibility to facilities that comply with environmental regulations and set environmental performance goals that go beyond compliance. In addition to improving environmental quality, agencies seek to use these programs to achieve social goals such as reducing costs, improving relationships, and changing culture at facilities and agencies. In this paper we explore approaches for measuring the social impacts of these programs, a task which has received relatively little attention from agencies or scholars. An initial hurdle for those wishing to understand the impact of PBEPs is to develop appropriate social performance measures. A second hurdle is to determine whether changes in social performance are the result of the program or some other factor. We offer a variety of techniques for identifying a PBEP's social impacts, all of which require gathering data from "control groups" of facilities or other actors that are not involved in these programs. Some of the most powerful techniques require evaluators to collect data from before participants joined the program. In order to utilize such techniques, agencies should take evaluation issues into account when they establish new PBEPs and collect pre-program data to compare to post-program outcomes or responses.