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The movement of CAC towards an integrated approach could be recognized as seeking a more effective legal system for environmental protection; hence the underpinning of the criminal sanction also needs to be more effective. It is perceived that the traditional cooperative compliance style of enforcement has diluted the deterrence of the law in some cases. The impact of the ‘capture theory’ could rightly make sense of how the closeness between the polluters and regulatory agencies leads to ineffectiveness of enforcement where a strict liability should be required. Although the current legislation has increased the sums of penal fine and introduced stricter imprisonment, it is too early to say the goal of effectiveness has been reached especially in the case of other initiatives arising from the industry.
From another view, the techniques of setting standards, reflected on setting objectives of specific standards, have been well developed towards a more integrated, scientific and effective approach, though this process is slow. In the field of air pollution control, the concept of ‘best practicable means’ (BPM) was adopted in Alkali Act 1874 for the purpose of replacing the rigorous previous uniform emission standards (used in Alkali Act 1863) , which finally failed to control the increase of emission caused by the growing number of plants, but BPM was proved being transformed by the Inspectorate’s interpretations. As Ogus’s comment, it was ‘randomly applied by rudimentary administrative machinery’. The Inspectorate’s approach, which is conciliatory and co-operational for applying performance standards, had existed for a century. Until 1970s, resulting from the cost/benefit analysis, critics considered that the flexible approach led to the benefits too weighted towards works, and the inspectorate’s free consultancy service was deemed as ‘public pay’ rather than ‘polluter pay’ for the emission. Since then, the RCEP continued to recommend new measures, particularly for multi-media pollutants, the BPEO, alone with ‘sustainable development’. In a RCEP’s report, BPEO was defined as ‘for a given set of objectives, the option that provides the most benefit or least damage to the environment as a whole, at acceptable cost, in the long term as well as the short term’ . It is clear that the ‘at acceptable cost’ gives room to balancing the costs and benefits of pollution and/or pollution control. One has known that BPEO in conjunction with IPC is a statutory footing in Part I of EPA 1990. In section 7 of EPA 1990, the condition of an authorization for IPC is the ‘best available techniques not entailing excessive cost’ (BATNEEC) should be used in licensing systems. An aim of BATNEEC is to promote technical innovations. The Environment Act 1995 goes further. It sets out National Air Quality Strategy, in response to road traffic pollution, which seeks to map, as far as possible, the future ambient air quality policy in the medium term.
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