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Recent years have seen increasing demand for wider application of strategic environmental assessment (SEA), especially SEA of major policies, as a powerful instrument to safeguard the environment during the rapid industrialization and urbanization in China. Debates on SEA are concentrated on its feasibility and effective implementation in practice. This study applies Emergy analysis within the framework of social–economic–natural complex eco-system theory to overcome the limitations of methods used for assessing regional sustainability so far. This established model is tested in the case of Chinese paper industry to assess the sustainability of 5 policy scenarios. The results show that Emergy-based Indices (EbI) are more effective to measure the sustainability of industry complex ecosystem, thus EbI approach is very useful in SEAs on policy scenarios of a given complex ecosystem.

In the policy-making process concerning energy and environmental issues, cooperation between government and firms is a means to create a more efficient energy and environmental policy. Intermediary organizations can play an important role in this policy-making process. Aim of this study is to get insight into the role of one specific intermediary organization: the industry association. In this paper, we focus on the Dutch paper and board industry. Important policy themes for this industry are waste water, waste, and energy efficiency. We distinguished four types of governmental policy instruments: top-down regulation, interactive regulation, negative economic instruments, and positive economic instruments. We analyzed the role of the industry association in the policy-making process for all of these four instruments. The results clearly show different (relative) roles of the industry association in different steps of the policy-making processes and for different types of instruments.

The effect of investments on environmental variables has been discussed through the win–win rhetoric, specifically in micro-level analysis. On the macro-level the win–win rhetoric has been replaced by the arguments for and against the substitutability of natural and manufactured capital. Here these two concepts belonging to different levels of analysis are linked by looking at the environmental and economic effects of chosen investment strategies in a traditionally capital-intensive industry over time. The paper shows that, rather than generalise the existence of win–win situations or the substitutability of capital, these positions are determined by purely situational factors. As a result, in the assessment of substitutability, the specific operating context of the industry needs to be taken into account. This implies also that environmental policy needs to be designed to be adaptive and responsive to those situational factors to create beneficial outcomes for the economy and for the environment.

Internalizing environmental costs is a necessary condition for an effective environmental policy. Since the majority of socio-economic activities cannot be free of environmental impacts, the noninternalized (external) environmental costs impose a peculiar thievery of welfare. Charging environmental costs through environmental taxes and other economic instruments is a necessary condition for avoiding welfare thievery. In this context, the anti-tax approaches emerging within ecological economics are found to be misleading and directing away from an effective environmental policy. Environmental responsibility is a different issue from the charging of the environmental costs. Therefore, environmental taxes should not be considered as an induction to less environmental responsibility and, hence, to environmental degradation.

Authorities in a number of countries, including Australia, have become increasingly concerned about the serious threats to public health and the environment arising from exposure to hazardous wastes. While economists can provide essential information to policymakers regarding the lifesaving benefits of regulatory controls on toxins, certain problems arise from using the economist’s preferred method as a basis for policy assessment. One problem concerns the appropriate measure of risk to use in estimating the benefits of reducing environmental risks. Another concerns the possibility that use of the economist’s technique of benefit assessment may result in policies which do not maximise the number of lives saved. This paper attempts to clarify the issues and to defend the economist’s approach from ill-informed criticism.

ObjectiveTo determine key points of intervention in urban food systems to improve the climate resilience, equity and healthfulness of the whole system.DesignThe paper brings together evidence from a 3-year, Australia-based mixed-methods research project focused on climate change adaptation, cities, food systems and health. In an integrated analysis of the three research domains – encompassing the production, distribution and consumption sectors of the food chain – the paper examines the efficacy of various food subsystems (industrial, alternative commercial and civic) in achieving climate resilience and good nutrition.SettingGreater Western Sydney, Australia.SubjectsPrimary producers, retailers and consumers in Western Sydney.ResultsThis overarching analysis of the tripartite study found that: (i) industrial food production systems can be more environmentally sustainable than alternative systems, indicating the importance of multiple food subsystems for food security; (ii) a variety of food distributors stocking healthy and sustainable items is required to ensure that these items are accessible, affordable and available to all; and (iii) it is not enough that healthy and sustainable foods are produced or sold, consumers must also want to consume them. In summary, a resilient urban food system requires that healthy and sustainable food items are produced, that consumers can attain them and that they actually wish to purchase them.ConclusionsThis capstone paper found that the interconnected nature of the different sectors in the food system means that to improve environmental sustainability, equity and population health outcomes, action should focus on the system as a whole and not just on any one sector.

Publication of a White Paper on ''Grand Challenges of the Future for Environmental Modeling'' is announced. The White Paper has been prepared for the US National Science Foundation (NSF) in the setting of its several Environmental Observatory initiatives.

Governments around the world are seeking to achieve socially just transitions to environmentally sustainable modes of agricultural production. Policy makers have increasingly sought to engage an array of societal actors in the collaborative design and implementation of associated policies, which we refer to as Agri-Environmental Policy (AEP) initiatives. Yet, the existing literature includes little context specific exploration of the motivations of those who engage with such initiatives. This paper addresses this gap by exploring the motivations of a small group of actors who established and coordinated a collaborative group to apply to one AEP initiative in Ireland – the European Innovation Partnership for Agricultural Productivity and Sustainability (EIP-AGRI). This group included three farmers, an agri-environmental policy advocate, and a research scientist. Drawing on assemblage literature, we illustrate how each of these actors' motivations emerged 1) based on the specific relationships in which they operated and 2) based on their imagining of potential future scenarios, which they sought to actualise through EIP-AGRI. This paper thus provides a qualitative account of how motivations emerge as different actors creatively navigate complex sets of relationships. We illustrate the utility of an assemblage approach to explore such motivations in ways that account for specific contexts and the capacity of each actor to engage with possible futures. We conclude that the capacity of collaborative approaches to AEP to appeal to actors from different backgrounds relies heavily on such actors’ ability to envisage and anticipate new possibilities. This line of exploration helps us to better understand the extent to which collaborative AEP may align the multiple goals associated with transitioning to environmentally sustainable and socially just food production systems.

This paper examines the implications of growing international production fragmentation-induced trade in intermediate goods on environmental quality. Specifically, by making use of a general equilibrium framework, this paper explores the link between trade in intermediate goods and pollution in a setting of endogenous environmental policy. The paper shows that international trade in intermediate goods, through an increase in the number of components available to the international producers, affects the level of pollution and environmental quality. Specifically, developed countries may reduce pollution at the cost of more pollution in developing countries.

This paper examines the drivers of distribution of pollution-intensive enterprises (PIEs) at the intraurban level that are less studied. Employing the complete spatial database of PIEs obtained from the National Economic Census of 2004, 2008, and 2013, the paper analyses the spatial restructuring of PIEs within Foshan, China, a typical manufacturing city in transition. We find that the changing role of environmental regulation induced by the environmental policy regime transformation has resulted in the siting strategy shift of PIEs, and both the 'Pollution Haven Hypothesis' and the 'Porter Hypothesis' have been overly simplified in the research conducted at the regional or global level. Based on the Foshan case, we further conceptualize the pattern of spatial restructuring of PIEs that would help to understand the fast green economy transition taking place in Chinese cities, followed by some policy and research implications.

How to choose environmental policy instruments within a clearly defined scope of the market mechanism and government intervention will profoundly affect the policy effectiveness. Through a systematic review of 111 representative literature, this paper traces the theoretical development of environmental policy instruments, empirical analyses based on the CGE (Computable General Equilibrium) model, and globally practical experience. We find that the reflections on environmental policy instruments have shifted from command-based to market-based, from trade-offs between quantity-based and price-based instruments within the scope of market-based instruments to combining both, and finally a reasonable allocation of both command-based and market-based instruments. The CGE model promotes the shift, deepens the theory, and accelerates the transformation from theoretical thinking to practical application. By providing approaches to recognize and measure the overall economic costs of environmental policies, the CGE model plays an important role in validating efficiency theories, identifying efficiency losses, and amending policy instruments. It also promotes the implementation of environmental tools through region-pertinent settings and simulations. Based on reflections and discussions upon existing literature, we propose that the market should play a dominant role in allocating resources to obtain long-term environmental goals with corresponding environmental regulations as supplementary; under the circumstances with market efficiency losses, command-based instruments should be employed to cope with market failures. The results in this paper can facilitate the expansion of the environmental policy theory and also assist governments with better selection and formulation of environmental policy instruments relying on a solid theoretical basis and rational practical approaches.

This paper examines how storylines shaped policy responses to environmental imperatives in an Australian regional planning system between 1991 and 2017. It builds upon existing literature that utilizes the ‘storylines’ conceptual model to distil and critically examine how discursive framing can shape environmental policy responses. This paper empirically establishes storylines within the regional planning system of South East Queensland, Australia that discursively shaped policy responses to three specific environmental imperatives: protecting regional biophysical features, sustainability, and climate change. It critically discusses how storylines associated with each imperative discursively framed and influenced planning policy responses at the regional scale. It reports how planning policies evolved as each environmental imperative was institutionally detected, discursively framed through storylines and responded to through regional-scale policy frameworks.

This paper analyzes the tax incentives and aids adopted in the taxes and environmental policies to improve the energy efficiency of Spanish households. The established environmental policy presents advances although with incipient results, since the energy efficiency of the houses still plays a secondary role. In the area of taxes, no tax incentives have been effective in reducing the investment in improvements in the energy efficiency of homes, especially in those of old construction. Our conclusions indicate the convenience of promoting the energy efficiency of homes through the fiscal route. In this sense, it proposes incorporating an incentive to the Personal Income Tax linked to improved energy rating of housing. Also, it raises the improvements in the current regulations on tax benefits on the Real Estate Tax and on the Tax on Building, Installations and Infrastructural Work. These are two of the main features of this paper.

Vehicle automation is coming, but environmental and energy imperatives are NOT what’s motivating it. In fact, its energy and environmental outcomes are deeply uncertain. The promise of autonomous vehicles (AVs) is greater safety and mobility. The question is: How do we achieve that promise while reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and saving energy? Future AV scenarios range widely, from dramatically higher to dramatically lower GHG emissions. Fortunately, the best case for the environment is also the best case for business, for the economy, and for safe and affordable mobility: autonomous Taxi fleets that operate clean vehicles, encourage ridesharing, and are integrated with other public and private transportation modes. Governments, businesses, drivers and riders make decisions that can increase or decrease the likelihood of the best-case scenario. The stakes are very high, as the transportation sector is now the largest source of U.S. GHG emissions. Emissions are equal to (1) emissions per-vehicle-mile, multiplied by (2) vehicle-miles traveled (VMT). This paper explores the business, technology and behavioral decisions with respect to automation that have the greatest impact along these two dimensions. It then identifies policy interventions that could influence these key decisions to achieve the best GHG outcomes. AVs are an important international issue, although this paper is focused on the United States.

Half of the original 13 Swedish nuclear power reactors will be shut down by 2020. The decommissioning of these reactors is a challenge for all parties involved, including the licensees, the waste management system, the financing system, and the Swedish Radiation Safety Authority (SSM). This paper presents an overview of the Swedish regulations for decommissioning of nuclear facilities. It describes some of the experiences that SSM has gained from the application of these regulations. The focus of the present paper is on administrative aspects of decommissioning, such as SSM's guidelines, the definition of fundamental concepts in the regulatory framework, and a proposed revision of the licensing process according to the Environmental Act. These improvements will help to streamline the administration of the commercial nuclear power plant decommissioning projects that are anticipated to commence in Sweden in the near future.

This paper presents an extension and application of the two-stage stochastic optimization methodology to determine electricity generation technology choices and capacity additions under sequential and multiple uncertainties. Specifically, the model presented in this paper addresses how uncertainties in electricity demand, capacity factor of wind and solar technologies, and environmental policy combine to affect the capacity additions of electricity generation technologies. This study unpacks the impact of these uncertainties to find that, on the one hand, when policy uncertainty is isolated from uncertainties in demand and capacity factor, neither of the two uncertainties dominates the other; instead they are complementary. Capacity factor uncertainty will dictate the types of technologies to be deployed while demand uncertainty will determine the amount of capacity to be installed or purchased. On the other hand, a combination of the three dimensions of uncertainty highlights intriguing insights that demonstrate the dominance of one uncertainty over the other. Under two different environmental policies, emissions standards and carbon taxes, the optimal prescription of generation technology combinations with respect to capacity additions are varied. However, we find that carbon tax will be more efficient at reducing CO2.

Environmental degradation is currently one of the biggest challenges for policy makers designing public policies. In particular, the emission of greenhouse gases as side effect of human activity is a significant problem. One of the methods and instruments used in the public sector to limit the progressing environmental degradation are environmental taxes. It is an element of fiscal policy used by countries around the world, including in the European Union, although it has no compulsory nature. So far, studies on the effectiveness of environmental taxes are not explicit. The effects of environmental taxes differ in EU countries, also environmental taxes systems are of different construction, and tax policies in this scope vary as well. This paper uses the taxonomic measure based on the Weber median to analyse the link between environmental taxes and environmental degradation. 23 EU countries belonging to OECD were analysed for 2016, on the basis of the Eurostat dataset. The study attempts to answer the question whether environmental taxes are an effective instrument for shaping environmental policy and whether they can become an important tool in the decision-making process at the government level. The paper assumes that the role of environmental taxes and their impact is different in developed and converging economies. The results prove a positive relationship between environmental taxes and environmental performance in the case of one indicator (Share of renewable energy in gross final energy consumption) for others a negative link is reported.

Information is central to the assessment and regulation of fisheries, yet underreporting remains a persistent problem, especially in the small-scale and developing country fisheries. Private actors, using a variety of enumeration approaches and technologies, have started to supplement government enumeration programs to meet a range of reporting obligations. This paper introduces a social practices approach to understand the response of fishers to private enumeration interventions. We base our analysis on the introduction of landing enumeration, fisher logbooks and Spot Trace devices by the Indonesian NGO, Masyarakat dan Perikanan Indonesia (MDPI) in a Fair Trade USA certified handline tuna fishery in Eastern Indonesia. The results show how a social practices approach offers a grounded understanding of responses to monitoring interventions that extends beyond conventional analyses of fishery-dependent data collection. The paper concludes that understanding data collection as a set of socially mediated practices that intervene in established fishing and landing practices can help to improve the design of fisheries data collection.

Citizen engagement is heralded as essential for food democracy and equality, yet the implementation of inclusive citizen engagement mechanisms in urban food systems governance has lagged behind. This paper aims to further the agenda of citizen engagement in the transformation towards healthy and sustainable urban food systems by offering a conceptual reflection on urban living labs (ULLs) as a methodological platform. Over the past decades, ULLs have become increasingly popular to actively engage citizens in methodological testbeds for innovations within real-world settings. The paper proposes that ULLs as a tool for inclusive citizen engagement can be utilized in two ways: (i) the ULL as the daily life of which citizens are the experts, aimed at uncovering the unreflexive agency of a highly diverse population in co-shaping the food system and (ii) the ULL as a break with daily life aimed at facilitating reflexive agency in (re)shaping food futures. We argue that both ULL approaches have the potential to facilitate inclusive citizen engagement in different ways by strengthening the breadth and the depth of citizen engagement respectively. The paper concludes by proposing a sequential implementation of the two types of ULL, paying attention to spatial configurations and the short-termed nature of ULLs.

This paper examines how value chain coordination affects the ability of aquaculture producers to engage in eco-certification. Through a comparison of global salmon and shrimp value chains, it is argued that production risks and producer capacity are key determinants in the type of chain coordination adopted by lead firms. The results challenge global value chain governance theory by indicating that it is hierarchical (or vertically integrated) forms of coordination that are associated with high capabilities and low risk rather than market forms of coordination. It is also shown that eco-certification is more likely to be adopted in value chains with more engaged forms of coordination. This in turn means that eco-certification is a far less ‘hands off’ form of regulation than widely thought. The paper concludes that for certification to engage producers operating under market forms of chain coordination new arrangements are needed that can respond to challenges of improving producer capability and production risk. Statement of relevance By understanding the role of risk and producer capability this paper contributes to improving the application and impact of eco-certification in global aquaculture production.

This paper analyzes the effects of environmental policy on employment (and unemployment) using a new general-equilibrium two-sector search model. We find that imposing a pollution tax causes substantial reductions in employment in the regulated (polluting) industry, but this is offset by increased employment in the unregulated (nonpolluting) sector. Thus the policy causes a substantial shift in employment between industries, but the net effect on overall employment (and unemployment) is small, even in the short run. An environmental performance standard causes a substantially smaller sectoral shift in employment than the emissions tax, with roughly similar net effects. The effects on the unregulated industry suggest that empirical studies of environmental regulation that focus only on regulated firms can be misleading (and those that use nonregulated firms as controls for regulated firms will be even more misleading). The paper’s results also suggest that overall effects on employment are not a major issue for environmental policy, and that policymakers who want to minimize sectoral shifts in employment might prefer performance standards over environmental taxes.

Growth in the nanotechnology sector is likely introducing unnatural formations of materials on the nanoscale (10-9m) to the environment. Disposal and degradation of products incorporating engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) are likely being released into natural aquatic systems un-intentionally primarily via waste water effluents. The fate and behaviour of metallic based nanoparticles (NPs) such as silver (Ag) in aquatic waters is complex with high levels of variability and uncertainty. In-situ physical, biological and chemical (natural attenuation) processes are likely to influence ENM fate and behaviour in freshwater systems. Surfaced functionalized particles may inhibit or limit environmental transformations which influence particle aggregation, mobility, dissolution and eco-toxic potential. This paper focuses on ENM characteristics and the influence of physical, chemical and biological processes occurring in aquatic systems that are likely to impact metallic ENMs fate. A focus on silver NPs (while for comparison, reporting about other metallic ENMs as appropriate) released to aquatic systems is discussed relating to their likely fate and behaviour in this dynamic and complex environment. This paper further highlights the need for specific risk assessment approaches for metallic ENMs and puts this into context with regard to informing environmental policy and potential NP influence on environmental/human health.

This paper explores the emergence of forms of ‘beyond farm’ assurance in the aquaculture sector, designed to increase the inclusion of smallholders and scale up environmental sustainability. The analysis reveals a ‘spectrum of assurance’, representing contrasting levels of trust in sustainable production and consumption. At one end of this spectrum attempts emerge to foster self-determined assurance models with internal verification that represent growing trust in the ability of subjects to organize sustainability improvements that extend beyond individual farms. The other, more dominant end of this spectrum, however, is populated with prescriptively and externally verified assurance models that demand high levels of control-driven assurance, demonstrating distrust in sustainability practices that extend beyond individual farms. The paper concludes that, to scale up sustainability, beyond farm assurance models must overcome the limitations of prescriptive assurance by finding fundamentally new ways of trusting farmers and their local counterparts in the global agro-food system.

This paper aims to provide new evidence on the relationship between green investment and firm performance through micro-level data. Data of energy listed firms in China from 2008 to 2017 are used here to explore this relationship. The research results show that green investment has a significant and positive correlation with financial performance, that is, increasing green investment helps improve financial performance. In the third year after investment in energy conservation and emission reduction, financial performance has been significantly improved. Additionally, environmental tax, government subsidies, and technological innovation have different positive moderating effects on green investment in promoting financial performance, and this result is more obvious in the long-term performance. Lastly, this paper finds that green investment helps reduce environmental violations and promote environmental performance, and environmental performance can strengthen the impact of green investment in improving the long-term performance of firms. This conclusion implies that firms should take environmental investment as its long-term strategy.

For the past few decades, jurisdictions have been using ecosystem and human health indicators to report on progress in achieving environmental policy goals. However, scholarship and practice indicate there is increasing need for governance indicators to identify gaps in policy, management and adaptive capacity. There has been significant growth in the use of governance indicators in hopes of improving outcomes in multi-level, multi-jurisdictional, multi-actor governance systems. This paper applies the OECD’s water governance indicators in two complex transboundary water governance systems in North America: the Great Lakes and Rio Grande-Bravo basins. The paper provides insights into how governance can be assessed and evaluated using water governance indicators, and highlights some of the challenges of applying governance indicators to transboundary water systems. Further, the paper reflects on how governance indicators connected to comparative and contextual analysis may serve as a foundation for a better integration of scholarship and practice.

Tourism is one of the prime manifestations of the ‘great acceleration of humankind’ since the Anthropocene started around 1950. The almost 50-fold increase in international tourism arrivals has substantial implications for environmental sustainability, but these have not yet been fully explored. This paper argues that a full exploration requires the study of tourism as a complex socio-ecological system. Such approach integrates environmental processes and stakeholder behaviour and puts feedbacks in the spotlight. Systemic insights can inform strategies to address tourism's problematic environmental performance. The paper finds that systems approaches in tourism research are rare and identifies a number of challenges: the large number of stakeholders involved; the heterogeneity of stakeholders; and the lack of transdisciplinarity in tourism research. The paper then argues that agent-based modelling can help address some of these challenges. Agent-based modelling allows to run simplified tourism systems with heterogeneous stakeholders and explore their behaviour, thus acting as living hypotheses. They do this by: (1) representing tourism's dynamics in a systemic, intuitive and individual-based way; (2) combining theories from different domains; (3) unpacking the link between stakeholder behaviours and emergent tourism system patterns; and (4) connecting researchers and stakeholders. Agent-based models allow representation of heterogeneous agents driven by plausible needs, who perceive local context and interact socially. Companion modelling is identified as a promising tool for more effective stakeholder inclusion.

The environmental dimension of sustainability implies the role of cities, considering their institutional vocation to territorial management and their proximity to the needs expressed by the community. This paper aims to investigate the implementation of a sustainable approach by cities in the realization of environmental policies. The methodology followed is regression (GLS method) that relates the expenses for the environmental policy of a sample of Italian cities (116) to some environmental indicators for the same municipalities (considering 2003–2011). Furthermore, t-test methodology is applied to compare the sample average values to the Italian average values of the selected environmental indicators. The paper takes into account not only a specific phase of sustainability, but it also considers the whole sustainability approach. In fact, the research connects the financial starting point of environmental policy (city's environmental financial commitment) to its environmental impacts (environmental indicators). The results obtained show that the investigated cities, on the one hand, direct environmental expenses to critical factors affecting environmental sustainability but, on the other hand, their environmental policies are not very effective. The research output gives useful information to city managers and politicians in order to focus their environmental policy on a sustainability approach that is effectiveness oriented.

The Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) program has provided policy innovation for global environmental affairs. China, the largest developing country in the world, is also faced with serious environmental problems. China developed a unique environmental policy – ecological compensation (Eco-compensation), which combined the flexibility of the PES mechanism with efficient government management. The paper studies the efficiency of eco-compensation policy in a large-scale region and the stability of policy in a long-time. We use the counterfactual method - Synthetic Control Method (SCM) to analyze the eco-compensation policy. Zhejiang province, China, which is the first province to implement Eco-compensation policy, chose as study case. We run several robustness checks to discuss the influence of other factors, including economy, politics and geology. The result shows that the eco-compensation policy improve the region's environment significantly. And it never has negative impact for the economy of Zhejiang. We discuss some experiences and challenges of this policy. The paper thinks that localization and the hybrid of government and market could provide successful experience for this policy.

Public concerns surrounding landscape conservation, noise pollution and impacts on bird populations are commonly incorporated into the planning phase of wind energy projects. However, public involvement tends to be highly localized and procedural, aimed at informing local stakeholders and gaining their acceptance for implementation. At the same time, other ways of engaging the public have emerged that move beyond invited stakeholder participation to facilitate the co-production of wind energy technologies and the landscapes in which they are placed. This paper systematically reviews the academic literature with the aim of identifying and characterizing these modes of co-production. A total of 230 papers published between 2009 and 2019 that report on public engagement with wind energy were included in our review. From this sample, we characterise public engagement into three modes of co-production: (1) local co-production, in spatially proximate wind energy projects; (2) collective co-production, performed through collaboration among different actors in the wind energy sector, joined ownership or consumption of wind energy; and (3) virtual co-production, mediated through information technology. These different modes of co-production cover a broad spectrum of ways in which local and non-local publics engage in decisions about where, when, how and by whom wind energy projects are designed, developed and managed over time. Combined, they can offer guidance for future research on how the wind energy sector can further support a transition to sustainable and inclusive energy systems.

Globally, aquaculture is expanding rapidly, with salmon becoming one of the most dynamic and fast-growing production systems in the world. Despite its commercial success, Chilean salmon production has navigated through severe economic and sanitary crises; followed by consecutive policy changes. Between 2007 and 2009, the rapid spread and the multiple effects of the Infectious Salmon Anemia virus (ISAV) marked a tipping point in the trajectory of the salmon aquaculture in southern Chile. This paper examines the discursive mechanisms through which the Chilean salmon aquaculture industry is currently being re-framed in the aftermath of the ISAV crisis, with a focus on searching for the emergence of ecosystem-related elements post crisis. The analysis shows that Chilean salmon aquaculture is being re-framed by the reproduction of three main discourses: biosecurity, sustainable protein and The Promise of Patagonia. The paper concludes that despite the staggering effects of the ISAV crisis on the national salmon production and on coastal communities more than a decade ago, new discourses are focused on the legitimization to growth, in the absence of integrated marine ecosystem-related elements, indicating a crucial gap toward environmental sustainability in salmon aquaculture.

Policy makers and environmental agencies have echoed concerns brought forward by academics about the need to address the rebound effect for achieving absolute energy and environmental decoupling. However, such concerns have generally not been translated into tangible policy action. The reasons behind this inaction are not fully understood, and much remains unknown about the status of the rebound effect issue on the policy agenda and policy pathways available. Such knowledge gaps may hamper the development of effective policies to address this issue. In this paper, we examine the extent to and ways in which the rebound effect is considered in policy documents and analyse thirteen specific policy pathways for rebound mitigation. The effectiveness of the pathways is scrutinised and conclusions are offered to mitigate rebound effects. The main policy conclusions of the paper are that an appropriate policy design and policy mix are key to avoiding undesired outcomes, such as the creation of additional rebound effects and environmental trade-offs. From the discussion, economy-wide cap-and-trade systems as well as energy and carbon taxes, when designed appropriately, emerge as the most effective policies in setting a ceiling for emissions and addressing energy use across the economy.​​​​​​​

This paper investigates the relationship between environmental degradation, income and regulation for the Alberta province of Canada. This issue assumes a value added since Alberta is the third-largest oil reserve in the world after Saudi-Arabia and Venezuela. The province is interested by large extractions of unconventional oil from bituminous sands, which produces high greenhouse gas emissions (CO2, CH4, N2O and HFC). Our attention is focused on the environmental overexploitation, specifically air quality depletion, related to the oil sands extraction processes first and then on the level of GHG of the province. The paper has the following results: i) We provide a first assessment of the levels and the growth rates for GHG specifically generated by Alberta oil sands extraction, while distinguishing between in situ and mining extraction method. ii) We find a positive and strong relationship between economic growth and air degradation for the Alberta region during the last decade, discussing the issue in light of EKC literature. In this context we are not aware of other contribution addressing this question. iii) Our analysis highlights that the average energy intensity indicator of Alberta is higher by 11% then overall Canada, which is among countries with highest energy intensity. iv) The paper, next, propose an original indicator where we frame the relationship between GDP and GHG in a global view. We construct the Sustainable Income Index for Alberta and some selected countries relevant for our investigation. v) Eventually the paper discusses results in light of the possible regulation issues in the framework of International Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) guidelines and Kyoto Protocol.

Construction industry contributes significantly to environmental degradation, and governments in many countries which are endeavouring to address the situation. Malaysia is no exception. This paper examines the path towards green construction project delivery in Malaysia, focusing on current green policies and initiatives by governments. The historical waves in Malaysian approaches to tackling environmental issues are described, starting from the early 20th century, through the 1990s to the present, and the influence of these approaches on construction practices is analysed. Based on the findings of policy review, essential green construction practices aimed at mitigating the adverse effects of construction activities on the environment in Malaysia were identified. This paper paves the way for future studies in construction and sustainability in Malaysia, especially for the Southeast Asian region where sustainability practices are urgently needed.

The differences in consumption levels across different strata of income and income inequality give raise to differences in the effects of income inequality on the level of the consumption-based greenhouse gas (GHG) emission. However, the impact of inequality on consumption-based emissions has been scarcely analysed. Therefore, the aim of this study is to test the relationship between income inequality and consumption-based GHG emission per capita by applying the country-level data for 1990–2014. Due to the prevailing economic structures, those relationships may be non-linear and imposition of pre-defined functional relationships in the estimation may induce additional bias. In order to circumvent this issue, the partially linear regression is applied in this paper. The non-parametric part of the regression is applied to examine the linkages between the income inequality and GHG emission per capita, whereas the other controlling variables are included in the linear part of the model. The results indicate a non-liner relationship between income inequality and GHG emission per capita along with a U-shape relationship between GDP per capita and the GHG emission per capita. This suggests tailored environmental policies are required for regions with diverse economic structures. This paper reveals how to achieve the reduction of income inequality and climate change simultaneously.

Although the consideration of socio-economic demands with biodiversity conservation is now high on the environmental policy agenda, it is not yet standard practice in spatial planning. This is argued to be related, among others, to a lack of awareness among stakeholders and practitioners of the underpinning role of ecosystem functioning and biodiversity to support human well-being. Meanwhile, there is mounting critique on the absolute focus of biodiversity conservation on static properties such as species and habitats. The establishment of more ecologically sensible objectives that include ecosystem processes besides species and habitats is put forward as a more effective way of environmental conservation. Methodological approaches increasingly consider ecosystem processes. However, the processes that are included mostly relate to aspects of biodiversity such as dispersal and productivity, and rarely do they include abiotic mechanisms that underlie biodiversity. We here report on the development of a method that integrates two principles which we identify as key to advance the integration of ecosystem services with biodiversity conservation in planning practice: (1) consider the variety of ecosystem processes, biotic as well as abiotic, that support biodiversity and ecosystem services, and (2) link the ecosystem processes to biodiversity and to socio-economic benefits to identify the common ground between seemingly conflicting objectives. The methodology uses a stepwise approach and is based on an extensive review of available knowledge on ecosystem functioning, expert consultation and stakeholder involvement. We illustrate how the methodology supports the setting of strategic goals to accomplish a healthy coastal ecosystem in Belgium, and exemplify how this may affect spatial plans. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate how including processes opens opportunities to align biodiversity and ecosystem services and how this increases chances to provide long-term benefits for biodiversity and human well-being. The paper may provide inspiration to advance current spatial planning approaches.

The purpose of this paper is to show that a number of pesticides is found in groundwater and drinking water resources and to define measures that should reduce the pesticide load in groundwater resources for drinking water in the future. Although the pesticide load that enters groundwater bodies in the Netherlands has gradually decreased over the past ten years, good drinking water quality in the future is not guaranteed. Currently, a number of pesticides ise found in groundwater abstracted for the production of drinking water, worldwide. The most frequently found compounds in the Netherlands are the herbicides BAM (2,6-dichlorobenzonitrile), bentazon and mecoprop. In shallow groundwater, the same compounds are generally found as in deeper groundwater that is abstracted for the production of drinking water, mainly bentazon and mecoprop. Additionally, DEET (N,N-Diethyl-meta-toluamide) is frequently found in shallower groundwater. In order to reduce the pesticide load in groundwater resources for drinking water in the future, 43 measures have been inventoried and ranked based on their scores for ‘effectiveness’ and for ‘practicability’. This paper describes both the most effective measures, with high scores on practicability, and those with limitations regarding practicability. These measures are the most relevant with respect to the frequently found compounds that are still authorised, i.e., bentazon, mecoprop and DEET and, to a lesser extent, glyphosate (due to the presence of its metabolite AMPA (aminomethylphosphonic acid) and glyphosate itself) and isoproturon. The implementation of abstraction-specific ‘Drinking Water Protection Files’, including the systematic collection of data about the relevant water abstraction and the sources and activities that can negatively affect water quality, is recommended.

From both health and environmental policy perspectives, it is advisable to ensure that individuals maximise the nutritional gains from eating meat, without having a significantly adverse environmental impact, i.e. sustainable meat consumption pathways are imperative. This is especially true for developing countries, where rising incomes and growing populations have meant that meat consumption has also risen. India is an example of a country where a large share of the population has been vegetarian due to religious and cultural factors, although this is rapidly changing. In this paper, we hypothesise that social interactions and globalisation are two factors that explain this shift in consumption behaviour, especially amongst Hindu households. These hypotheses are based on the theoretical findings of Levy and Razin (2012). The empirical results show that Hindus that are members of religious groups are less likely to eat meat than non-member Hindus, whereas Hindus that are members of non-religious types of groups are more likely to eat meat than non-members. We also find that Hindu households that frequently use sources of media such as newspapers, the radio or television are more likely to consume meat compared to Hindus that do not. This paper provides important policy implications, both in terms of the formulation of Nationally Recommended Diets in developing countries, and in terms of identifying the channel of influence of both social networks and globalisation on social and religious norms, consumption behaviour, and ultimately, on climate change.

Certification is widely seen as an innovative strategy for dealing with environmental problems in supply chains. As the number of labels available in the fisheries sector has increased, each with its own framing of sustainability, questions are being asked about their credibility. In tuna fisheries, contrasting approaches have led to conflict over, among other things, the credibility of competing labels. This paper investigates one such conflict between the Dolphin Safe and the Marine Stewardship Council certification schemes in the West and Central Pacific. It looks at how key practices like scientific rigour, inclusiveness, transparency/openness, impartiality/independence and impact contribute to label credibility and explains the importance of authority in understanding how certification schemes maintain influence within global production networks. The results demonstrate that despite substantially different levels of credibility within these networks, the application of an environmental standard is more connected to the authority of the standard setter than the credibility of the label. The paper concludes that understanding the more nuanced role of authority, both with and without credibility, offers new insights into the wider dynamics that shape environmental regulation in global production networks.

This paper reviews the extent to which sustainability governance has been integrated into the literature on sustainable chains and networks. The analysis brings together four main approaches to chains and network studies – supply chain management (SCM), global commodity chains (GCC), global value chains (GVCs) and global production networks (GPNs) – to examine how and the extent to which sustainability and sustainability governance are conceptualised and incorporated into their analytical frameworks. The results point to a shift in this combined literature from conceptualising the formation of global chains and networks as sites of inequality under conditions of globalisation, towards a renewed vision on the potential of chains as a site for social and environmental reform. Overall, however, we conclude that the literature on global chains and networks has not adequately conceptualised distinct modes of sustainability governance. In response, we offer an amended typology for identifying how firm and non-firm actors govern sustainability in chains, of chains and through chains in globalised commodity production and consumption. The paper finishes with an exploration of the research frontiers, challenges and continuing potential of chain and network studies to understand the governance of sustainability and a call for further academic debate on the kinds of integrated governance arrangements necessary for future sustainability reform through hybridised public-private economic practice.

The objective of the paper is to understand the determinants of the spatial location of participation in Agri-Environmental Schemes and, in particular, to understand the interplay between structural determinants, priority criteria and spillover effects in guiding participation. As a first step, the paper seeks to conceptualise the issue based on the existing literature. Thereafter, an econometric model is used to provide an empirical application on data regarding participation in measure 214 of the Rural Development Programme 2007–2013 in an Italian region (Emilia-Romagna). The results show that both priority scores and the spatial dimension are significant in affecting participation.

This paper provides fuel price elasticity estimates for single-unit truck activity, where single-unit trucks are defined as vehicles on a single frame with either (1) at least two axles and six tires; or (2) a gross vehicle weight greater than 10,000lb. Using data from 1980 to 2012, this paper applies first-difference and error correction models and finds that single-unit truck activity is sensitive to certain macroeconomic and infrastructure factors (gross domestic product, lane miles expansion, and housing construction), but is not sensitive to diesel fuel prices. These results suggest that fuel price elasticities of single unit truck activity are inelastic. These results may be used by policymakers in considering policies that have a direct impact on fuel prices, or policies whose effects may be equivalent to fuel price adjustments.

Continuing historical narratives of the early twentieth century nexus of conservationism, eugenics, and nativism (exemplified by Madison Grant), this paper traces the history of the contemporary US anti-immigration movement's roots in environmentalism and global population control activism, through an exploration of the thoughts and activities of the activist, John Tanton, who has been called "the most influential unknown man in America." We explore the "neo-Malthusian" ideas that sparked a seminal moment for population control advocacy in the late 1960s and early 1970s, leading to the creation of Zero Population Growth (ZPG). After rising to the presidency of ZPG, Tanton, and ZPG spun off the Federation for American Immigration Reform. After leaving ZPG's leadership, Tanton created additional anti-immigration advocacy groups and built up connections with existing organizations such as the Pioneer Fund. We trace Tanton's increasingly radical conservative network of anti-immigration advocates, conservationists, and population control activists to the present day. Tanton's archived papers illustrate, among other things, his interactions with collaborators such as ecologist Garrett Hardin (author of the famous "Tragedy of the Commons") and his documented interest in reviving eugenics. We contend that this history of Tanton's network provides key insights into understanding how there came to be an overlap between the ideologies and activist communities of immigration restrictionism, population control, conservationism and eugenics.

Innovation adoption and diffusion by firms are key pillars for the EU strategy on resource-efficiency and the development of a circular economy. This paper presents new EU evidence regarding the role of environmental policy and green demand drivers to sustain the adoption of resource efficiency-oriented eco-innovations. This paper originally implements new estimators to address the endogeneity of binary framed policy and demand covariates, which typically characterise firm level survey data. Our results suggest that when endogeneity is accounted for, environmental policy is the only factor always significant in driving the adoption of innovations that reduce the use of waste and material, while demand-side and market-factors do not always play a central role. The result is an important piece of new quantitative-based knowledge, which complements the currently large case study-based evidence on the setting of sound management and policy strategies for the circular economy.

This paper examines the different internal and external institutional factors that affect the decision of businesses in developing countries to adopt international certification (IC). Past studies focus on pressure from international laws, the role of multinationals, and businesses mimicking practices of their counterparts in developed countries. This paper finds that, in addition to these external factors, internal factors may have a significant role. Even though environmental regulation is weak in developing countries, governments do not ignore industrial pollution and casualties. They respond by increasing bureaucratic regulations for businesses and this can affect the decision to adopt IC. Furthermore, internal pressure may come from workers' unions that push for a safe and healthy working environment.

When designing air pollution reduction policies, regional decision makers face a limited budget, to choose the most efficient measures which will have impacts on several pollutants in different ways. RIAT+ is a regional integrated assessment tool that supports the policy maker in this selection of the optimal emission reduction technologies, to improve air quality at minimum costs. In this paper, this tool is formalized and applied to the specic case of a French region (Alsace), to illustrate how focusing on one single pollutant may exacerbate problems related to other pollutants, on top of conflicts related to budget allocation. In our case, results are shown for possible trade-offs between NO2 and O3 control policies. The paper suggests an approach to prioritize policy makers objectives when planning air pollution policies at regional scale., JRC.H.2-Air and Climate

A decent, or sufficient, lifestyle is largely considered an important objective in terms of a sustainable future. However, there can be strongly varying definitions of what a decent lifestyle means. From a social sustainability point of view, a decent lifestyle can be defined as the minimum level of consumption ensuring an acceptable quality of life. From an ecological sustainability point of view, a decent lifestyle can be defined as a lifestyle that does not exceed the carrying capacity of nature in terms of natural resource use. The paper presents results of a study on the natural resource use of 18 single households belonging to the lowest income decile in Finland. The yearly "material footprint" of each household was calculated on the basis of the data gathered in a questionnaire and two interviews. The results show that the natural resource use of the participating households was lower than the one of the average consumer. Furthermore, 12 of 18 households had a smaller material footprint than the "decent minimum" reference budget defined by a consumer panel. However, the resource use of all the households and lifestyles studied is still higher than long-term ecological sustainability would require. The paper concludes that the material footprint is a suitable approach for defining and measuring a decent lifestyle and provides valuable information on how to dematerialize societies towards sustainability.

In order to promote regional synergistic governance of haze pollution, this paper constructs a three-side evolutionary game model which includes a superior government and two local governments. Meanwhile, the evolutionary routines as well as stability strategy states of the game system are analyzed. As an embodiment of the innovation and originality of this paper, the heterogeneity of the game subjects and their influences on the game system are fully studied. The results show that the supervision and punishment of the superior government are necessary measures to form a stable synergistic governance model between heterogeneous local governments. In addition, it is an important guarantee for the effective implementation supervision to increase the reputation loss of the superior government's inaction. The conclusions of this paper are expected to provide some references for the government to formulate environmental policies.

Over the last decade Brazil has implemented a new and ambitious biofuel program: the National Program of Production and Use of Biodiesel (PNPB). When launching this program in 2004 the government stated that it wanted to avoid the same kind of geographical concentration, single crop focus, dominance of agribusiness, and exclusion of family farmers that have occurred with bioethanol production through the ProÁlcool policy since 1975. This paper compares the life histories of the bioethanol and the biodiesel policies of Brazil by analyzing their substantive policy content; the power and politics of actors that struggle for the design and implementation of the policies; and the polity in terms the organization and institutionalization of the policies. The paper concludes that both policies have become submerged by and dependent on the polity and politics of primarily the energy and agricultural sectors that operate as the two semi-autonomous governance fields. This submerging has shaped the substantive contents of biofuels policies, and explains why the 2004 biodiesel policy PNPB, in spite of its objectives for social inclusion and rural development, faces similar problems in implementation as its predecessor, the 1975 bioethanol policy ProÁlcool.

Environmental assessment (EA) follow-up provides a means for monitoring and evaluating the implementation of environmental impact studies. It is integral to the success or failure of a project or program. In spite of its importance, very little attention is given to the need for follow-up programs in most jurisdictions in Africa. Using a case study in the Ghanaian mining sector, this paper explores the challenges and opportunities within the country's EA process for an effective follow-up program. The paper is based on informal interviews, content analysis of relevant publications, official EA documents, and internet searches. The authors suggest a standard EA follow-up program to be formalized as an integral part of Ghana's environmental assessment policy. They also propose a follow-up process that harnesses existing opportunities within the country's EA system. This approach can be replicated in other African countries.