IG Problems in Thailand: Duty

EPC-EPD Model - a solution approach to Environment Protection Problems.
[This is written for ชุมชนคนรักโลก.]



Environment Protection Policy (EPP) --> Environment Protection Agency (EPA)
| |
v v
Environment Protection Bases (EPB)
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v v
Environment Protection Credit (EPC) - Environment Protection Duty (EPD) --> EP balance


[A bedtime story]

All of us need a home. Environment is our home that we live and work and play in.
We know that environment we live is the same environment that we get our food (and water we drink and air we breathe). If our environment is good - clean, safe and full of life - then we live well and happy. Good things in our environment helps us to achieve our dreams. But if our environment is bad --dirty, polluted, harmful and empty of plants and animals--, then our food becomes bad. Our home, our health and our lives are worse off.


We don't know why when there are many more people, our environment becomes dirty and unsafe, our food becomes less healthy and some food is even harmful. There is also a climate change in our environment too. This climate change comes because people do things without caring for our environment. People use cars and burn a lot of petrol and oil, and coal and gas and make a lot of heat and carbon dioxide and many other harmful gases and ashes. They make our air bad, our water bad, and our home and our food dirty and unhealthy.


When children live in bad environment, they are often sick, they don't grow well, they don't learn well and they get angry easily. When older people live in bad environment, they are often sick too. They get cancer --that dangerous disease that comes with chemicals and some processed food--. Older people are stressed in bad environment. They don't work well and they get angry easily too. When people get angry they may smash things or hit people in the family or other people. They make our home bad to live in.


We should make people pay if they make our environment bad. And we should use that money to pay people who they make our environment good. We will clean up our home. We will clean up our school, our parks, our roads and rivers. We will clean up our town, our country. We will make our environment good for all of us to live in. People will come from other countries to see and enjoy our good environment. They will go back and clean up their home and country. The whole world environment will be good for a long long time.


[A Simple Change in Law]

[Now we grow up and can understand more. We know about reward-and-punishment or carrot-and-stick and understand how it works. Lawmakers or politicians use it to change behaviour in population.]

An environment protection policy is clearly needed for the current condition of our environment. This is a proposal for public discussion on amendment to the Environment Protection Law (EPL) (พระราชบัญญัติส่งเสริมและรักษาคุณภาพสิ่งแวดล้อมแห่งชาติ พ.ศ. ๒๕๓๕).
NB. มาตรา ๓๘ ในพระราชบัญญัติส่งเสริมและรักษาคุณภาพสิ่งแวดล้อมแห่งชาติ พ.ศ. ๒๕๓๕ may already allow this policy to be implemented by ผู้ว่าราชการจังหวัด.

We say
'Environment' สิ่งแวดล้อม means 'the total surrounding condition which we live' or 'a space which we live with plants, animals and processes'
'Environment Protection' (EP) รักษาสิ่งแวดล้อม means 'management for the best condition in our environment'
'Environment Protection Credit' (EPC) ค่าเสริมสิ่งแวดล้อม is an award for doing good to our environment
'Environment Protection Duty' (EPD) ค่าปรับสิ่งแวดล้อม is a penalty for doing harm to our environment

This proposed environment protection law provides bases to penalize individuals and business entities for doing harm to our environment and to award individuals and business entities for doing good to our environment.

Environment Protection Agency (EPA) is to administer and to enforce this law. EPA makes and maintains lists of harm and good together with bases for assessment for EPC or EPD.
Environment Protection Bases for Assessment (EPB) is to be clearly tabulated, made available to the public, and amended as needed.

[public discussion#1 What do we mean 'doing harm' and 'doing good']
[Refer to พระราชบัญญัติส่งเสริมและรักษาคุณภาพสิ่งแวดล้อมแห่งชาติ พ.ศ. ๒๕๓๕
http://www.pcd.go.th/info_serv/reg_envi.html for examples, details and comparisons.]

For examples:
- burning and releasing cabon dioxide is doing harm to our environment, so responsible persons or entities are liable by law to pay EPD for harm assessed by EPA.
- growing trees is doing good to our environment, so EPC is given to responsible persons or entities.
(EPC can be used to offset EPD within an account period or a later period.)

- littering or not disposing wastes properly is doing harm to our environment, so responsible persons or entities are liable by law to pay EPD for the harm assessed by EPA.
- cleaning up and disposing wastes properly are doing good to our environment, so responsible persons or entities are awarded EPC by law for the good assessed by EPA.

- EPD may be assessed on processes and products in compliance with EPB in advance and collected at end of accounting periods or at point of sale. For examples coal fired electricity generating plants are assessed and issued with EPD quarterly; EPD on petrol and gas are assessed by unit of sale and collected at points of sale; farmers and manufacturers are assessed for the nett result of EPC and EPD; and so on.

- packaging materials represent the bulk majority of rubbish in our environment now, collecting EPD on packaging materials at point of sale would increase the prices of packaged goods. Retailers and manufacturers can initiate environmental programs to generate EPC to offset their EPD. Collecting packaging materials generates EPC even when the collected materials are sold to recyclers for some money. Recycling operators also get EPC because of the nature of their business.

- a school installs solar panels, solar hot water systems and runs regular community clean-up events, so the school gets several EPC for these 'good for our environment' actions. The school has more EPC than EPD. What should the school do?

[Public discussion#2: Can EPC be traded or auctioned for money or other goods and services?]


[Some key features of this EP law.]
- Investment in research, new technologies and equipment that reduce harm oe increase good to our environment are to be assessed and awarded EPC or EPD accordingly

- EPC and EPD are to be clearly recorded in accounts by individuals and entities for taxation purposes; a general audit may be conducted at anytime as the need arises; discrepancies are to be rectified as a part of taxation assessment.

- EPA is to submit an independent review of EPB and independently audited balance sheet of EPC and EPD to Parliament annually; a suitably formatted report of EPA operations is to be released to public media at least annually and and under freedom of information law on request.


NB. This annual balance sheet is an accounting summary of EPC and EPD. Ideally, the condition of our invironment is indicated by net [sum of EPC - sum of EPD] for the account year. Greater EPC means our environment is better. Greater EPD means our environment is worse but we have an amount of EPD for use to improve our environment. But it can also indicate problems with EPB or in EPA's operation.

[Public dicussion#3: What does EPB look like?]

NB. The Environment Protection Bases (EPB) are a collection of rules and formulae for assessing EPC and EPD. There are as rules for environmental pollutants such as carbon dioxide, Plastic types (as classified by plastic codes), hazardous chemicals and so on. There are rules for processes or activities such as burning, dumping, littering and spraying. All assessments produce EPC or EPD with a monetary value equals to the 'set' 'environmental price' of (say permit to release into our environment) one unit of a specific pollutant. EPC can be viewed as the reversal of EPD that is the price to recapture and store the pollutant from our environment. For chemicals and other wastes EPD may be assessed on their potential to do harm (not after they have done harm). Though in practice this value depends on technologies and many other factors. The aim is to set EPC and EPD values thoughtfully to encourage environment protection actions and innovations.

For examples:
EPB:rule #n1 - product: shampoo, pollutant: xyz, EPC value: 1.23/mg, EPD value: 1.23/mg
pollutant: bottle, EPC value: 0.25, EPD value: 0.15
...
EPB:rule #m7- process: barbecue, pollutant: smoke, EPC value: 0.45, EPD value: 0
pollutant: heat, EPC value: 1.05, EPD value: 0
...
EPB:rule #w9- process: grow tree, pollutant: fuel, EPC value: 1.00, EPD value: 0
pollutant: CO2, EPC value: 10.00, EPD value: 0


NB. พระราชบัญญัติส่งเสริมและรักษาคุณภาพสิ่งแวดล้อมแห่งชาติ พ.ศ. 2535 already 'describes' what is good and what is bad for our environment. EPB is in a way a re-arrangement of the same list with added details for items and assessed values. An online database of EPB should be readily and freely available on Internet and other media.
...
[Public discussion#4: Is there exemption from EPD?]
EPD on some processes like home cooking, barbecues and celebrations seem quite harsh and can create resentment. Other processes such as heating or cooling food and drinks are very much the same. However, these activities and many more are not good for our environment. We should list them in EPB but set the EPD on them to 0 -- for now.
NB. gas and electricity are already assessed and EPD collected at point of sale.

[Public discussion#5: What about imported products?]
Imports are subjected to EPD (and other import taxes and duties) and assessed in the same way as 'made in Thailand' products. Importers must pay EPD and affix an EPD stamp to each individual unit of the products. products without EPD stamps are illegal. Buyers and sellers of contraband products can be arrested and prosecuted.

[Public discussion#6: Who should be responsible for keeping this EP Law?]
คณะกรรมการสิ่งแวดล้อมแห่งชาติ are currently responsible for EP policy (EPP) and funding. สำนักงานนโยบายและแผนทรัพยากรธรรมชาติและสิ่งแวดล้อม (ONEP), กรมควบคุมมลพิษ (PCD in กระทรวงวิทยาศาสตร์ เทคโนโลยีและสิ่งแวดล้อม) and ... are responsible for EP operations. Our environment is important and there are lots of work to do to keep it 'good'. EPA is to orchestrate EP actions to ensure best EP outcome.

[Public discussion#7: Should EPD be included into the 'general revenue'?]
EPD can be treated as a revenue like other taxes, duties and charges. And EPC must be used to encourage 'doing good' to our environment. To ensure that EPC is delivered promptly and without fail to keep EP actions continueing a trust fund and account to manage EPC and EPD should be set up separately. There is already กองทุนสิ่งแวดล้อม (Environment Protection Fund - EPF). EPD can be viewed as a premium for EP insurance and EPC a payout.
NB. กองทุนสิ่งแวดล้อม จัดตั้งขึ้นในกระทรวงการคลังตามพระราชบัญญัติส่งเสริมและรักษาคุณภาพสิ่งแวดล้อมแห่งชาติ พ.ศ. 2535 โดยมีวัตถุประสงค์เพื่อสนับสนุนการแก้ไขปัญหาสิ่งแวดล้อมภายใต้กระบวนการ ความร่วมมือของทุกภาคส่วนในการจัดให้มีระบบบำบัดอากาศเสีย น้ำเสีย และระบบกำจัดของเสียสำหรับ ควบคุมบำบัดและขจัดมลพิษ รวมทั้งการดำเนินกิจกรรมใดๆ เพื่อการส่งเสริมและรักษาคุณภาพสิ่งแวดล้อม ทั้งนี้ การใช้จ่ายเงินกองทุนสิ่งแวดล้อมดังกล่าว จะต้องอยู่ภายใต้กรอบที่กำหนดไว้ในพระราชบัญญัติส่งเสริมและรักษาคุณภาพสิ่งแวดล้อมแห่งชาติ พ.ศ. 2535

[Public discussion#8: Should EPD be capped - not high than certain amount?]
Harm to environment can cost many billions dollars (See Gulf of Mexico Oil Leaks). Some harms may immediate response. But most products and processes are low impact repeating market items. Following VAT model, should EPD be set as a small fraction (say 3%) of the price?

[Public discussion#9: It is your turn to raise a discussion point!]
///

[Now let us look at Clean-up Programs.]
EPA and EP programs at national level will take time to establish and operate continually. In the meanwhile, rubbish accumulates in our environment. A survey of rubbish is needed to quantify current state of of our problem. The cost to do a survey is about the same as the cost of doing clean-up and survey at the same time. There are already several events to clean-up organized by various local conservation groups throughout the year now. These events can be co-otfinated into a national clean-up and survey program to collect and record data on rubbish at the same time. The data collected is used to set goals and action plans. The rubbish collected...???

A National Clean-up Proposal based on this EPC-EPD model is to follow ;-)

[Note on "Carbon Trading"; EPC-EPD covers more than just carbon dioxide.]
Carbon Price:
Carbon pricing — the method most favored by economics for reducing global-warming emissions — charges those who emit carbon dioxide (CO2) for their emissions. That charge, called a carbon price, is the amount that must be paid for the right to emit one tonne of CO2 into the atmosphere.[1] Carbon pricing usually takes the form of a carbon tax or a requirement to purchase permits to emit (also called "allowances"). Because such permits are privately tradable and emissions are limited to the total number of available permits (the cap), this system is known as cap-and-trade.

Emissions trading:
missions trading or cap and trade ("cap" meaning a legal limit on the quantity of a certain type of chemical an economy can emit each year)[1] is a market-based approach used to control pollution by providing economic incentives for achieving reductions in the emissions of pollutants.[2] Various countries have adopted emission trading systems as one of the strategies for mitigating climate-change by addressing international greenhouse-gas emission.[3]

A central authority (usually a governmental body) sets a limit or cap on the amount of a pollutant that may be emitted. The limit or cap is allocated and/or sold by the central authority to firms in the form of emissions permits which represent the right to emit or discharge a specific volume of the specified pollutant. Permits (and possibly also derivatives of permits) can then be traded on secondary markets.[4] For example, the EU ETS trades primarily in European Union Allowances (EUAs), the Californian scheme in California Carbon Allowances, the New Zealand scheme in New Zealand Units and the Australian scheme in Australian Units.[4] Firms are required to hold a number of permits (or allowances or carbon credits) equivalent to their emissions. The total number of permits cannot exceed the cap, limiting total emissions to that level. Firms that need to increase their volume of emissions must buy permits from those who require fewer permits.[2]