Cary Coglianese, the Edward B. Shils Professor of Law, Professor of Political Science, and Director of the Penn Program on Regulation, has been appointed a member of a committee of the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Transportation Research Board that is charged with studying the federal government’s inspections of offshore oil and gas operations.
As part of the Committee, Coglianese will contribute to a project examining, reviewing, and recommending updates to the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement’s (BSEE) Offshore Oil and Gas Operations Inspection Program. The Committee aims to consider whether the inspection program is effectively meeting its regulatory mission, and it will look to practices by other regulators from around the world that BSEE might employ to supplement and improve the program. The Committee will also take into account policies, risks, technologies, and practices that the BSEE should consider as the program evolves both in the near and long term.
In addition to Coglianese, the Committee includes leading scholars from the fields of engineering, business, and economics, as well as leaders from the energy industry, environmental community, and regulators and consultants from around the world.
In his own research, Coglianese specializes in the study of regulation and regulatory processes, with an emphasis on the empirical evaluation of alternative regulatory strategies and the role of public participation, negotiation, and business-government relations in policy making.
“This committee of the National Academy of Sciences is charged with addressing vital questions about improving the performance of government regulation,” said Coglianese. “The safe and environmentally sound development of offshore oil and gas resources presents significant regulatory challenges.”
Coglianese previously served on the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine Committee for a Study of Performance-Based Safety Regulation, which in 2017 released a report entitled Designing Safety Regulations for High-Hazard Industries. Relying extensively on Coglianese’s research on regulatory design, that earlier report offered advice about selecting appropriate ways of regulating industrial activities that pose catastrophic risk to the public.