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Objectives “Environmental Blindspots” are newly defined as a type of social problem within the realm of various environmental pollution and climate issues, wherein they are pushed down in priority due to factors such as corporate profit, consumer preferences, and government regulations, consequently remaining unresolved. This ultimately leads citizens to experience a sense of guilt. Despite the significant influence they wield on the welfare of current and future generations, various environmental social issues characterized by environmental blindspots (such as micro-hazardous substances like microplastics and environmental hormones) fail to become major considerations in societal decision-making. Consequently, they are not actively discussed within the social community. This absence of social consensus on these issues reflects the current situation. As a result, citizens repeatedly make choices that do not prioritize environmental values due to a perception of powerlessness stemming from the absence of environmentally friendly options, the belief that the issue is too immense to tackle individually, and lack of knowledge about specific actions to take for environmental problem-solving, among other factors. In this process, they experience involuntary and deliberate emotions of guilt. Since environmental blindspots are issues collectively experienced by the societal community comprising citizens, businesses, and government, solutions must also be derived collectively through collective thinking. This review has endeavored to incorporate such efforts. Methods In this review, to develop a more effective interdisciplinary research methodology for addressing the previously mentioned environmental social issues, ten interdisciplinary researchers from the Environmental Engineering and Social Sciences fields at the center for convergence research (SEBIS) collaborated, leveraging their respective expertise to document literature survey results. Firstly, they reported on the environmental behavior, toxicity, distribution, and regulatory status of micro-hazardous substances, namely (micro)plastics and volatile organic compounds, which are the research subjects of the Environmental Blindspot Research Center. Secondly, they compiled relevant treatment technologies. Subsequently, they described the socio-structural causes of environmental blindspots and various solutions to environmental social issues through social science methodologies. Results and Discussion To address the environmental blindspots, a key environmental social issue, it is necessary to advance various environmental technologies alongside responsible production by businesses and the enhancement of citizen environmental awareness. It is crucial for the government to institutionalize policies in the public domain to achieve this. Understanding the structural roles of citizens, businesses, and government is essential. It requires ethical consumer awareness and active participation, public campaigns and education, as well as effective government environmental policies to incentivize environmental friendly technological innovations by companies. Conclusion In this review, the issue of environmental blindspots as an environmental social issue is being addressed comprehensively for the first time. Through this, we aim to establish an effective communication and cooperation system among social entities to explore solutions to environmental blindspots, and to propagate this ability to address social issues to future academic generations.

Objectives Recently, during two-three years of the COVID-19 pandemic, the drive-thru service system has been one of the most actively used non-face-to-face systems to reduce the risk of infection. The business of coffee shops and fast-food restaurants using drive-thru service systems keeps growing. However, carbon dioxide and particulate matter problems in idle running, including traffic congestion and pedestrian safety issue, were brought up in the drive-thru service systems. In this study, carbon dioxide and particulate matter generation were calculated. Also, we proposed existing problems, improvements, and policy issues. Methods We calculated the carbon dioxide and particulate matter generation in the idle running of vehicles in drive-thru service using several assumptions, the number of vehicles, the idle running time, and emission factors. Results and Discussion We provided the carbon dioxide and particulate matter generation in the drive-thru service system. Also, we proposed and explained the existing problems, improvements, and policy issues; employees’ respiratory health problems, installation of particulate matter reduction and monitoring system, “Idle Stop & GO” and eco mode use, Performance of environmental improvement charge, single-use cup & product and collection issue. Conclusion More accurate calculations and studies are needed using more good data such as the number of vehicles, the idle running time, and emission factors. More active policy applications should be considered with revealed problems and proposed improvements in this study.

The recent historiography of the South Korean environment and science in the 1960s and 1970s pays attention to the ignored environmental problems and their social implications in the rapid growth of science and technology. This paper contributes to the previous literature by examining the history of the City Saemaul Movement (도시새마을운동). It examines how urban environmental management was, for the first time, initiated in the form of mass mobilization in early 1970s South Korea. In 1971, the Saemaul Movement (or New Village Movement) took place in order to modernize rural areas. The City Saemaul Movement began one year later was part of it but was quite a contrast to the original one in terms of its targets and aims: it aimed to resolve or mitigate environmental and social problems--so-called urban pollution at the time--in urban areas, especially in Seoul. The City Saemaul Movement was a mass mobilization of urban citizens to improve the residential environment projects; it also aims to instill moral ideals in the urban communities that "urban citizens are more immoral than rural people and should resolve all urban problems on their own hands with responsibility." Through this work, this paper will shed light on the authoritarian government's irresponsible response to the environmental degradation in the early 1970s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to analyze the environmental policy of the current Brazilian government of Bolsonaro, considering the fires that spread in the Amazon in June and August of last year. The Amazon, known as the "largest repository of ecological biodiversity in the world" and "the lungs of the Planet", has suffered a wave of devastation in recent decades, and its devastation today is becoming accelerated and massive. That situation has been exacerbated since the inauguration of the government of Jair Bolsonaro, a politician of the extreme right. Therefore, the analysis of the background and the causes of this situation is part of this study. It also includes a comparative analysis, which considers the Lula government's environmental policy. This comparative approach can better point out the problematic features and issues of the current Brazilian government's environmental policy. It is shown here that since 2003, when Lula took over the command of his country, there was a major advance in the issue of the environment, although with some restrictions, that was always treated from the point of view of social inclusion policy. However, during the governments of Dilma and Temer, the devastation and deforestation in the Amazon increased gradually, culminating in the inauguration of the Bolsonaro government, whose environmental policy is very similar to the developmentalism of the military dictatorship that held power in Brazil from 1964 until 1985. Furthermore, it is also observed that environmental policy has until now been characterized by the following persistent factors: a progressive increase of influence of the so-called "banca ruralista" (in official terms, the Frente Parlamentar da Agropecuária, FPA) in the Brazilian National Congress, which defends the interests of landowners (latifundiários) and agribusinesses; the usual government amnesty for land grabbing (illegal appropriation of public land), and other factors, as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research aims to investigate the mechanism of 14 states that participated the U. S. Climate Alliance after the announcement of the withdrawal of the Paris Climate Accord. There is little explanatory power in "race to the bottom" approach on states' environmental regulation policy in particular the challenge toward the federal government decision. Rather, the policy action of the state in challenging the policy of the federal government in the field of environment can be understood as a cooperative federalism structure. The challenge of individual states against the federal government withdrawal from the international treaty is the result of state policy autonomy within the cooperative federalism structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]