Earth Day arth Day-special in its special now as we approach its 20th-anniversary observance on April 22, 1990. This issue of EPA Journal is dedicated to Earth Day and its meaning then and now. President George Bush leads off the issue with an article that reflects his perspective on the environment at home and abroad. EPA Administrator William K. Reilly follows with a piece articulating a goal that he feels should become a key focus of the nation's environmental initiatives: pollution prevention. An article by EPA Journal writer Jack Lewis describes the spirit and character of the first Earth Day, and an accompanying feature surveys a group of people who were key environmental players in 1970 and also reports on what they are doing now. Former U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson, the founder of Earth Day, outlines the legacy of Earth Day as he sees it. Next is a series of articles looking back and looking ahead, occasioned by this 20th anniversary of the "year of the environment." For in addition to Earth Day, other environmental landmark events helped to make 1970 a special year: in particular, the birth of EPA; the establishment of the President's Council on Environmental Quality and an environmental impact review program (both mandated by the National Environmental Policy Act of 1970); and the passage of the Clean Air Act of that year. The authors are EPA's first Administrator, William D. Ruckelshaus; the first Chairman of the President's Council, Russell E. Train; former Congressman Paul G. Rogers, who was involved in the deliberations leading to the 1970 Clean Air Act; and two activists who figured prominently in 1970 Earth Day events-Denis Hayes, who headed the national Environmental Teach-In office that coordinated Earth Day, and Edward W. Furia, who directed Philadelphia's Earth Week program. Next, illustrating the burgeoning activity that may make 1990 another year of the environment, an article by Journal writer Roy Popkin reports on the growing commitment within the entertainment industry to promoting environmental awareness. Two articles report on subjects that demonstrate how dramatically the environmental agenda has changed since 1970. First, John S. Hoffman and Robert Kwartin from EPA's Global Change Division write about ongoing efforts to design. refrigerators that are free of chemicals that damage the stratosphere and to make thi new technology available in developing countries. Second, Joel S. Hirschhorn, Senior Associate at the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment, explains the steps needed if American industry is to adopt a preventive approach to industrial waste rather than the traditional effort to control waste at the "end-of-the-pipe." Then Paul and Anne Ehrlich, a husband-and-wife team of environmentalists, describe the nature of the environmental crisis in their view and outline an approach for dealing with it. Next, providing an industry perspective, Jerald terHorst, Director of National Public Affairs for the Ford Motor Company, gives a rundown on efforts to clean up a majo pollution source, the automobile. The phenomenon of the "Greens" in West Germany and other European countrie is explained in terms of its political dynamics by Konra von Moltke, a senior fellow at The Conservation Foundation and former Director of the Institute for International Environmental Policy in Bonn. In a related article, Bowdoin College professor John Rensenbrink discusses the prospects for a Greens movement in the United States. This issue of the magazine concludes with a report on the clean-up tasks confronting another industrialized society-the Soviet Union-authored by Alexei Yablokov, a key environmental official in the country. New York City's Fifth Avenue was closed to motor vehicles for Earth Day 1970. The result was one of the biggest people jams in the city's history. Patrick A. Burns photo. The New York Times EPA is charged by Congress to EPA Journal is published by the Contributions and inquiries should be addressed to the Editor, The annual rate for subscribers in the U.S. for EPA Journal is $8. The charge to subscribers in foreign countries is $10 a year. The price of a single copy of EPA Journal is $2.25 in this country and $2.81 if sent to a foreign county. Prices include mail costs. Subscriptions to EPA Journal as well as to other federal government magazines are Anyone wishing to subscribe to EPA Journal should fill in the form at right and enclose a check or What I Believe About the Environment by President George Bush ast summer, I took my 13-year-old grandson on a fishing trip to Jackson Lake, Wyoming. The memory of that day lingers the two of us casting our lines, sinking long, flashy spinners deep into the crystalline water. After some effort, we caught a few Mackinaw trout and let them go. But the real catch was for our eyes. From our small boat, we watched elk warily emerge from the forest at dusk to drink at the lake. And rising out of the forest in the distance were the Tetons-jagged, immense, snow-capped, invincible. No words, no photo, no painter could do them justice. Of course, there was a time when all of North America was as primitive and pristine as Jackson Hole. But aside from protected areas like the Grand Tetons, the buffalo hunters and the settlers. changed the face of the land, forever. The exploitation of natural resources was a natural way of life for the pioneers. In fact, it was the only way of life. So our ancestors did what they had to do to build a great nation, simply assuming that the land offered a limitless bounty. Today, of course, we know better. And knowing better, we must act better. President Teddy Roosevelt declared 80 years ago that nothing short of defending this country in wartime "compares in importance with the great central task of leaving this land even a better land for our descendants than it is for us." He was one of the first to perceive that nature is not an infinite resource. Environmental destruction in National Park Service photo. one place on Earth can have serious consequences for other, sometimes remote, parts of our planet. In fact, some scientists compare the Earth to a single organism, a living system whose ability to survive depends on its overall well-being. It is not possible to restore our environment to a perfectly natural state. Yet we've also learned that a growing economy can only be sustained with a healthy environment. This requires a balance trade-offs, tough decisions, careful planning, exact studies, and creative proposals. Seeking that balance, environmental leaders like Senators Ed Muskie, Howard Baker, the late Henry Jackson, and others put aside party differences in the late 1960s to craft landmark comprehensive environmental legislation. On January 1, 1970, President Nixon began the new decade by signing the National Environmental Policy Act into law. All the historic environmental laws of the 70s followed this bold step: the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the laws regulating pesticides, toxic substances, and hazardous wastes. It was also roughly 20 years ago that EPA began its historic mission under the strong leadership of Bill Ruckelshaus. And in this same tradition Bill Reilly brings to EPA his own distinctive brand of leadership leadership based on both environmental expertise and real commitment. In the first year of this Administration, we've taken on many tough environmental problems. On June 12, I announced ways we can use the market to reduce emissions of acid rain, urban smog, and toxic air pollution-all included in the first major overhaul of Grand Teton N... Wyong the Clean Air Act to be proposed in more than a decade. Later in the year, we called for $710 million for Clean Coal Technology; a ban on nearly all uses of asbestos by 1997; and a ban on the export of hazardous waste. In addition, we've accelerated our leadership on global change, proposing a 28-percent increase in global environmental research and offering to host an international conference next fall to negotiate a framework treaty on global change. But the federal government is only part of the story. Twenty years ago, the environmental movement was gaining strength in the city halls and state capitols of our nation, as well as in Washington. And the new commitment to a cleaner, safer environment wasn't just confined to government. It grew from the bottom up-not just from school boards, city councils, and state legislatures-but from millions of homes. Americans came together as environmental volunteersspontaneously, almost instinctively--to save the Earth. And it was this movement that created the first Earth Day on April 22, 1970. Earth Day began as a spectacular movement of citizen leadership. It has become an American tradition, worthy of future generations. A president quickly learns to see policy in the broadest terms possible. Urban and housing policy must be related to transportation, transportation policy to energy, energy policy to agriculture, and so on. Applying this same perspective, one cannot fail to see that deforestation, ozone depletion, ocean pollution, and the threat of global warming interconnect to challenge our future. We no longer enjoy the luxury of leisurely action. Environmental protection must become a higher priority for us all. If our response is to be effective, then all the nations of the world must make common cause in defense of our environment. This is a message I took to Sierra Club photo the peoples of Europe in May. In Mainz, West Germany, I said that my generation remembers a world ravaged by war. And, of course, Europeans have rebuilt their proud cities and restored their majestic cathedrals. But I told them: "What a tragedy it would be if your continent were again spoiled, this time by a more subtle and insidious If our response is to be effective, then all the nations of the world must make common cause in defense of our environment. danger-that of poisoned rivers and acid rain." I told them of America's environmental tragedy in Alaska. I noted that countries from France to Finland suffered after Chernobyl, and that West Germany is struggling to save the Black Forest. The bottom line is this: Environmental destruction respects no borders. When I suggested that the United States and Western Europe extend a hand to the East, the people of Europe on both sides of the Iron Curtain responded with enthusiasm. Since then, working with my counterparts in Western Europe, we have reached agreements to share our environmental technical and regulatory knowledge with Eastern Europe. I hope these agreements become a model not just for Europe, but for the world. And I am determined that in the 1990s, the United States of America will continue to assume responsibility by providing world environmental leadership. At home, we've brought to my Administration outstanding environmental professionals, like Michael Deland, who chairs the important Council on Environmental Quality. We've broken new ground by declaring that pollution prevention is our ultimate goal. For too long, we've focused on clean-up campaigns and penalties after the damage is done. It's time to reorient our policies to technologies and processes that reduce or prevent pollution-to stop it before it starts. In the 1990s, pollution prevention must go to the source. To save the Earth will require our best. efforts. Everyone must volunteer to help. Business, labor, and consumers must cooperate. Environmentalists and industrialists must be partners, not adversaries. Local communities, large and small, must enlist. And so must families-we all can learn to generate less waste and to recycle the waste that we do produce. In fact, those families that do recycle have found it makes economic, as well as ecological, sense. Finally, there is one simple thing that you can do on Earth Day, regardless of your age or ability. I ask you to join me in sowing a legacy of cleaner air and more beautiful horizons. I ask you to perform a simple act. I ask you to plant a tree. You don't have to be a poet or a painter to appreciate a tree. Trees cool the Earth on a summer's day. They quiet the noise of a freeway. They provide a natural wind break in winter. And every tree makes America a little greener, a little more like the verdant nation the Pilgrims knew. I hope that Earth Day will once again. demonstrate that solutions to environmental problems are emerging from the good will, generosity, and vision of the American people. We have already given the world so much. Let's give the world an example of volunteerism and environmental leadership on April 22, 1990, and in the years to come. |