Análise de impacto regulatório no direito ambiental : limites e possibilidades

Environmental regulation lacks transparency. Agencies responsible for environmental protection, in most of the cases, only publish the final versions of the regulatory measures adopted, without further details on supporting, technical justifications, alternatives considered and possible contributions from social participation, among other issues. As a consequence, the environmental management faces accountability issues. To overcome this scenario, the regulatory impact analysis is presented as an instrument able to add clarity, objectivity and efficiency to environmental decision making. The incorporation of the tool, however, should be performed with particular caution, in view of three major peculiarities of Environmental Law. Firstly, the sector not only handles with risk, but also with uncertainty, in which due to the absence of information, it is impossible to make probability calculation about possible outcomes. Secondly, environmental regulation deals with non-tradable assets to which traditional cost-benefit analysis is not easily applicable. Finally, the environmental regulatory authority is shared by various agencies at all levels of government, increasing the odds of technical failures.