What is the “Comparative Risk” Project?
What does it mean to me?


[From the Introduction of the Report of Ranked Environmental Risks In New Hampshire, May 1997]
 

The environmental risks that scare us often are not the risks that harm us. The New Hampshire Comparative Risk Project is a public/private partnership that was started in 1993 to improve our understanding of environmental risk. Project participants were motivated by the desire to protect New Hampshire’s environmental "quality of life," our "healthy ecology, healthy people, and healthy economy."

New Hampshire became involved because businesses, environmental organizations, and state agencies recognized that while much progress has been made in reducing air, water, and land pollution over the last 25 years, many challenges remain. The "command and control" approach to regulation has reduced pollution from many large identifiable sources such as smokestacks, waste pipes, or open dumps. New approaches, using new tools, are needed to identify the environmental risks we face today, and to propose effective solutions.

The comparative risk process is one such new tool. Project members tried to clarify what makes up such a complex issue as "environmental risk." The Project provided the opportunity to begin to sort out the difference between "fear" and "hazard," and to better understand the "hazard" component. The Project hopes its efforts will stimulate debate among New Hampshire citizens about the relative hazard of environmental risks, and will contribute to the process of deciding what needs to be done to reduce such hazards.

The risks studied and ranked are a subset of all risks, identified by asking both citizens and experts what they thought were the biggest risks to the environment, and to the health and "quality of life" of New Hampshire residents. At the start, none of the participants knew how the 50+ environmental risks would be ranked.

The ranked list of environmental risks in this report represents the blended judgment of the 55 members of the Public Advisory Group members participating in the ranking process. Many participants found their ideas changing as they worked with the information in the public health and ecological technical reports, read about the economic perspectives, and listened to each other. Every Project member was surprised by how they ultimately ranked certain risks. Almost every member disagreed with at least one of the ranks. But the Group as a whole agreed that, based on available information and judgment, the ranked list portrays with reasonable accuracy the greatest environmental hazards currently facing New Hampshire citizens.

As they evaluated and ranked risks, Public Advisory Group members applied consistent criteria from the technical reports. The criteria address the severity, extent, reversibility, and uncertainties associated with specific risks. Project participants also assumed that the current level of environmental regulation and public health protection would be maintained. Group members tried very hard not to consider the feasibility of managing risks during the risk ranking process, because the Project’s next step is to develop action priorities to reduce environmental risk, based on feasibility and other criteria.

The ranked risk list shows that while four of the top 10 risks threaten public health, four of the top five risks threaten the quality of New Hampshire’s land and water habitat. Such results reflect both the changing nature of public health threats, and the importance of New Hampshire’s forested, rural character to overall environmental "quality of life."

The Project’s process resulted in findings that may surprise some. For example:

  • Sunlight ("ultraviolet radiation") is ranked as a higher risk than "Pesticide Exposure." We know that between 1987 and 1991 in New Hampshire, 612 cases of malignant melanoma were diagnosed, and 141 people died from skin cancers caused by exposure to sunlight. During the same time, no deaths and no groundwater contamination from pesticides were documented.
  • "Petroleum" and "Non-Petroleum Hazardous Waste in Groundwater" have been more of a problem in New Hampshire in the past, but in the last ten years, changes in industry storage and management requirements have substantially reduced well contamination. The low midrange ranking of "Petroleum in Surface Water" conveys the widespread, but mostly localized nature of contaminated storm water discharges, spills, and operational losses of petroleum products. The ranking may have been higher if New Hampshire had experienced a large petroleum spill in a visible and ecologically fragile area such as the Great Bay.
  • Risks to New Hampshire’s drinking water quality have decreased because of many supply improvements made through the Safe Drinking Water and Clean Water Acts. "Waterborne Communicable Disease" was ranked among the top twenty risks because of the threat of e. coli bacteria, giardia, etc. in both surface and drinking water. Risks of exposure to "Chlorination By-products" from water treatment were ranked in the bottom third of the 53 risks.
  • The risk of exposure to "Air Toxics" was ranked in the bottom third of the list of ranked risks. Public Advisory Group members found that emissions of toxics such as solvents, chromium, chlorine, or benzene into the air are well regulated and monitored. So even though the threat of such toxics is recognized, the current likelihood of exposure is low.
  • The recent spread of rabies to foxes in Bristol, NH area illustrates the relationship of "Infectious Diseases in Wildlife" with "Environmentally Mediated Diseases" in humans (last such outbreaks of rabies in foxes were in 1973 and 1963-67). Recent cases of hepatitis from imported fruit in the U.S. West/Midwest demonstrate the threat of "food contamination." In New Hampshire, 122 cases of food poisoning were reported in 1994, and 153 cases in 1995, with no fatalities.

The Project’s overall goal is to empower everyone to reduce environmental risk in New Hampshire, through the work of businesses, citizens, state agencies, and environmental and other organizations.  An early example of effective risk reduction in outdoor air was the federal regulatory decision in the 1970’s to “get the lead out” of gasoline.  Air quality improved substantially, and deposition of lead onto land & into surface water decreased dramatically.   Nationally, new regulations are being considered on diesel emissions because of their contribution to creating  “Particulate Matter” and “Ground Level Ozone.”

Project participants recognize that creating the ranked list in this report is only a first step.  We hope the list will be revised as information improves and conditions change.  The Project also hopes to use the findings of the risk ranking to develop a wide array of action priorities that everyone can use to reduce the hazard of environmental risks.

We ask you to review the Report of Ranked Environmental Risks in New Hampshire,  and solicit your suggestions on how to reduce hazards to New Hampshire’s environmental “quality of life--healthy ecology, healthy people, and healthy economy.”  Please let us know if you think there are serious risks that are currently ignored, or less threatening risks that may be receiving too much attention, and the basis for your belief.

The ranking is not intended to discourage you from avoiding any hazard that scares you, or from taking action to reduce a risk that angers you, regardless of where those risks are ranked.  The Project members do hope you will support efforts to reduce the risks identified by this Project.

For more information about the Project, or for a copy of the Report of Ranked Environmental Risks in NH, please contact Katherine Hartnett, Executive Director, New Hampshire Comparative Risk Project, 18 Low Avenue, Concord, NH 03301, telephone (603) 226-1009, fax (603) 226-0042, NH toll-free 1-800-769-7420, e-mail khartnett@thejordaninstitute.org or any member of the Public Advisory Group.

Thank you for your interest.

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