Market-Based Instruments for Managing Hazardous Chemicals: A Review of the Literature and Future Research Agenda

We take stock of the lessons learned from using market-based instruments in chemicals management and discuss the potential for increased use of risk-based taxation in the management of pesticides and other hazardous chemicals. Many chemical substances cause significant diffuse emissions when emitted over wide areas at individually low concentrations. These emissions are typically very difficult and costly to control. The targeted chemical may exist in many products as well as in a wide variety of end uses. However, the current regulatory instruments used are primarily bans or quantitative restrictions, which are applied to individual chemicals and for very specific uses. Policy makers in the area of chemicals management have focused almost solely on chemicals with a very steep marginal damage cost curve, leading to low use of price regulations. The growing concerns about cumulative effects and combination effects from low dose exposure from multiple chemicals can motivate a broader use of market-based instruments in chemicals management.