The Idea of Air

How we view air, especially clean air, has meaningful normative and practical implications. Today, it is commonly recognized as an exhaustible natural resource. But air was not always thought of as something to be conserved, developed, and used. This Article is the first to explore and interrogate that view.

The shift to seeing air as a resource started in the first part of the twentieth century. Previously, air was characterized by its limitless supply of oxygen: a pure public good. Over time, the quality of that good changed, and a precious resource emerged. That resource—especially its chemical and physical characteristics—inspired a novel management concept and new approach to air pollution control (today considered the “pinnacle” of air pollution policy).

Treating air as a resource offered a new way to imagine our relationship to air. Indeed, this Article argues that the conceptual origins of the modern Clean Air Act (particularly the air quality standards concept) are grounded in natural resources policy rather than in common law nuisance or in pollution’s externalities. But treating air and, more recently, our atmosphere as a resource also anchors our way of thinking to the natural-resource paradigm. The atmosphere, in particular, may be beyond sustainable use.

Reimagining air may be necessary to address the worst impacts of a new problem for air: global climate change.