Putting a price tag on the environmental consequences of the cold war

Abstract

AbstractThe U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) Office of Environmental Management (EM) released the second Baseline Environmental Management Report (BEMR) in July 1996. The congressionally mandated report provides life‐cycle cost estimates, tentative schedules, and projected activities necessary to complete DOE's Environmental Management Program. This “base case” estimate is predicated on current program assumptions and the most likely set of activities. However, since the future course of the Environmental Management Program depends on a number of fundamental technical and policy choices, alternate program scenarios also were developed. This article describes the creation and implementation of the life‐cycle cost estimating process underlying the BEMR. It addresses the history of the Environmental Management Program and the requirement for life‐cycle cost estimates, organizational and methodological challenges to implementing life‐cycle planning, general methodology and results, and implications of life‐cycle planning.