This paper studies the dynamic relationship between economic growth, pollution, and government intervention. To do so, we develop a model that links pollution to the economy’s productive capacity, thereby capturing the feedback loops between economic activity, environmental degradation, and fiscal policy intervention. The model incorporates a pollution-sensitive damage function, taxes, and government spending while analyzing economic growth under different levels of government intervention. Therefore, the main paper’s contributions reveal that economies can achieve favorable outcomes with low or moderate government intervention, and that our results underscore the vital role of pollution mitigation policy in dynamically balancing economic growth with environmental sustainability.

Increasing interdisciplinary analysis of geoarchaeological records, including sediment and ice cores, permits finer-scale contextual interpretation of the history of anthropogenic environmental impacts. In an interdisciplinary approach to economic history, the authors examine metal pollutants in a sediment core from the Roman metal-producing centre of Aldborough, North Yorkshire, combining this record with textual and archaeological evidence from the region. Finding that fluctuations in pollution correspond with sociopolitical events, pandemics and recorded trends in British metal production c. AD 1100–1700, the authors extend the analysis to earlier periods that lack written records, providing a new post-Roman economic narrative for northern England.

In a world grappling with escalating agrochemical pollution, this article explores the potential for shifting from a security-centric approach to a human rights-based approach to safeguard health, the environment, and biodiversity. By engaging with European Court of Human Rights jurisprudence related to environmental protection and climate change, the article critically assesses how to address state (in)action regarding pollutants such as pesticides through human rights litigation. In its analysis, the article highlights climate change litigation as a catalyst for change to assert states’ threefold obligations to respect, protect, and realize human rights. It concludes that the legal approaches developed in climate litigation – with regard to both procedural and substantive aspects – provide a strong basis for addressing the human rights impacts of agrochemical harm.

Support for a high-ambition plastics treaty is gaining strength, particularly within global civil society and among lower-income developing countries. Still, opposition to binding measures – such as obligations to regulate petrochemicals or reduce global plastics production – remains intense and widespread. We propose the concept of a “petrochemical historical bloc” to help reveal the depth and extent of the forces opposing strong global governance of plastics. At the bloc’s core are petrostates and industry, especially producers of oil and gas feedstock, petrochemicals and plastics. Extending its influence are broader social forces – including certain political and economic institutions, consultancy firms and nongovernmental organizations – that reinforce and legitimize the discourses and tactics thwarting a high-ambition treaty. This bloc is driving up plastics production, externalizing the costs of pollution, distorting scientific knowledge and lobbying to derail negotiations. Yet the petrochemical historical bloc is neither monolithic nor all-powerful. Investigating differing interests and evolving politics within this bloc, we contend, can expose disingenuous rhetoric, weaken low-ambition alliances and reveal opportunities to overcome resistance to ambitious governance. In light of this, and toward highlighting fractures and potential counter-alliances and strategies, we call for a global research inquiry to map the full scope and nature of the petrochemical historical bloc.

The mercury discharged into the sea by the Chisso factory in Minamata, and the radiation released by the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, are not entirely different “accidents,” although one was the result of a “natural disaster” and one not. Minamata offers hints of future developments as Japan attempts to respond to and recover from Fukushima.

The incredible growth of China's cattle, sheep and dairy production is a visible phenomenon of the past twenty years, but its foundations were laid decades earlier. Seeking to industrialize its hinterland, and exploit its vast wealth of grazing livestock, China created slaughtering and processing facilities across its northern grasslands during the 1950s. Since the 1980s, much of this infrastructure has been privatized by companies which, like their predecessors, seek efficiency through economies of scale. Brutal competition over price and constant arrival of new domestic and foreign players have encouraged the integration of processing chains, but also sidelined small operators, and created gaps in safety best epitomized by the 2008 tainted milk scandal. Despite steps taken to “green” the production chain, it remains to be seen if such gaps have been adequately filled.

The Coronavirus hit Japan during our study-abroad semester in Kyoto. Here we present similarities in Japanese societal response to chemical pollutants throughout the long twentieth century and to COVID-19, as they became apparent to us through a chemistry course on Japanese industrial pollution.

Much ecological thought today turns to Japan's past for inspiration. The reason, according to conservative Japanese ecologists, deep ecologists, and environmental philosophers, is that Japan's history of aesthetic “oneness” with nature provides a model for the world to emulate as it addresses the global environmental crisis. I critique this view by showing that conservative, or more accurately, reactionary ecology in Japan is closely intertwined with ethnic communitarianism, Japan's wartime ideology of the 1930s, and deep ecology. I suggest that these forms of reactionary ecology reflect a fascist desire to create or rely upon a nationalistic narrative of Japanese cultural uniqueness that conceals the excesses of capitalism and operates to sustain the socio-economic order that is today generating ecological catastrophe.

This paper examines an endogenous growth model that allows us to consider the dynamics and sustainability of debt, pollution, and growth. Debt evolves according to the financing adaptation and mitigation efforts and to the damages caused by pollution. Three types of features are important for our analysis: the technology through the negative effect of pollution on TFP; the fiscal policy; the initial level of pollution and debt with respect to capital. Indeed, if the initial level of pollution is too high, the economy is relegated to an endogenous tipping zone where pollution perpetually increases relatively to capital. If the effect of pollution on TFP is too strong, the economy cannot converge to a stable and sustainable long-run balanced growth path. If the income tax rates are high enough, we can converge to a stable balanced growth path with low pollution and high debt relative to capital. This sustainable equilibrium can even be characterized by higher growth and welfare. This last result underlines the role that tax policy can play in reconciling debt and environmental sustainability.

Since 1979, plastic companies have significantly expanded their markets. Evidence suggests that excessive plastic use in Ethiopia has exacerbated environmental pollution, contributing to a “quadruple crisis” involving climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution and public health and economic impacts. To address this, the Ethiopian government needs to establish effective plastic waste management strategies. Key future direction and recommendation include (1) Developing and enforcing national strategies, including a ban on many single-use plastics, for sustainable plastic waste management; (2) adopting international best practices and policies to move toward a zero-waste approach; (3) investing in a circular economy and plastic waste management systems; (4) strengthening policies through comprehensive legislation and extended producer responsibility frameworks; (5) establishing a council to integrate scientific research into policymaking; (6) promoting green technologies and innovations, such as plastic waste-to-energy and smart waste management; (7) engaging in global efforts to monitor hazardous chemicals in plastics and support transparency in a toxic-free circular economy to ensure the public’s right to information.

This research aimed to develop biomarkers for estimating ammonia (NH3) emissions from dairy cattle manure over a 15-day in vitro incubation system. To generate different levels of NH3 emissions, the experiment utilized four manure experimental groups: 1 urinary nitrogen (U) to 1 faecal nitrogen (F) ratio (CT), 2 U to 1 F ratio (2U1F), and CT and 2U1F with lignite application (CT + L and 2U1F + L, respectively). The addition of lignite to ruminant manure aimed to enhance environmental sustainability through its beneficial properties. Three biomarkers, nitrogen (N) isotopic fractionation (δ15N), N: potassium (K) ratio, and N: phosphorus (P) ratio, were investigated. Manure δ15N increased linearly when NH3 emission increased in CT and 2U1F groups (R2 = 0.79 and 0.90, respectively; P ≤ 0.001), while manure N: P decreased when NH3 emission increased in CT + L and 2U1F + L groups (R2 = 0.73 and 0.85, respectively; P ≤ 0.001). No useful relationship was found between N: K and NH3 emission, apart from in 2U1F group (R2 = 0.84; P ≤ 0.001). The experiment found manure δ15N and N: P are complementary biomarkers to predict NH3 emissions, from non-lignite and lignite groups, respectively.

This article analyses the endogenous choice of farmers to be organic or conventional in a groundwater evolutionary model when a tax on fertiliser on conventional farmers is implemented by a regulatory agency. The analysis of the model shows that the coexistence of both type of farmers only occurs when the decrease in productivity due to organic production is relatively low and the price premium for organic products is relatively high. However, even if conversion is welfare improving, our results show that this conversion may be done at the expense of the water resource with a lower water table. An application to the Western la Mancha aquifer (Spain) illustrates the main results.