Geoscience Reference
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Recommendation: The committee recommends that EPA develop a more
systematic strategy to support innovation in science, technology, and prac-
tice.
In accomplishing the recommendation above, the agency would be well-
advised to work on identifying more clearly the “signals” that it is or is not send-
ing and to refine them as needed. Clearly identifying signals could be accom-
plished by seeking to identify the key desired outcomes of EPA's regulatory
programs and communicate the desired outcomes clearly to the private and pub-
lic sector. The committee has identified several ways in which EPA could ad-
dress this recommendation:
Establish and periodically update an agency-wide innovation strategy
that outlines key desired outcomes, processes for supporting innovation, and
opportunities for collaboration. Such a strategy would identify incentives, disin-
centives, and opportunities in program offices to advance innovation. It would
highlight collaborative needs, education, and training for staff to support innova-
tion.
Identify and implement cross-agency efforts to integrate innovative ac-
tivities in different parts of the agency to achieve more substantial long-term
innovation. One immediate example of such integration that is only beginning to
occur is bringing the work on green chemistry from the Design for the Environ-
ment program together with the innovative work on high-throughput screening
from the ToxCast program to improve application of innovative toxicity-testing
tools to the design of green chemicals.
Explicitly examine the effects of new regulatory and nonregulatory
programs on innovation while ascertaining environmental and economic effects.
Such an “innovation impact assessment” could, in part, inform the economic
evaluation as a structure that encourages technologic innovation that may lead to
long-term cost reductions. The assessment could also function as a stand-alone
activity to evaluate how regulations could encourage or discourage innovation in
a number of activities and sectors. It could help to identify what research and
technical support and incentives are necessary to encourage innovation that re-
duces environmental and health effects while stimulating economic benefits.
Science That Takes the Long View
As the committee has emphasized, the nature and scope of environmental
challenges are changing rapidly, as are the scientific and technologic tools and
concepts for dealing with them. For instance, the importance of nanoparticles
was not evident 2 decades ago. The problems that EPA will face 1 or 2 decades
from now are certain to include some challenges that we cannot imagine today.
But environmental-protection science in EPA has, for the most part, focused on
effects over shorter periods, in single media, or over small spatial scales. That is
understandable given regulatory demands for science. However, if EPA is to
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