In this collection of the best and most-requested articles from the Worldwatch Institute's award-winning magazine, "World Watch", the authors focus on such topics as energy and climate, the effects of water scarcity, the food prospect, oceans in distress, and consumerism and the future of the earth.

Reprints 17 articles from World watch magazine on problems of the environment and possible solutions. No bibliography. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

The most serious environmental problems of the twenty-first century have the potential to alter the course of life on this planet. Global warming, toxic waste, water and air pollution, acid rain, and shrinking energy supplies are frightening challenges that may threaten our future if we do not face up to them.p Global Environmental Challenges provides important information and gives us hope about the environment. This book first helps us to grasp these difficulties, then shows us the choices we can make. How long to leave a light on, whether to take the car, the train, or bicycle to work, whether to recycle or throw away, whether to vote to curb continued suburban sprawl-all of these decisions can make a difference.p This collection of some of the best essays and articles on the environment comes from a variety of sources, including journals, magazines, websites of ecological/conservation organizations, and other publications.p Five major sections investigate the interaction of population growth,consumption, and environment; the emerging crisis in freshwater around the globe; global climate and atmosphere (including global warming); biodiversity loss; and the concept of sustainable development-using natural resources to place future human development on a sustainable path. The final section on sustainable development reveals how we can take action. As individuals, we can make a difference readily and easily without making huge personal sacrifices. As societies, we can work together in a global community of interest to sustain the earth.p This valuable resource offers readers a better understanding of our environmental problems and presents solutions to improving the health of theplanet.p

In this urgent time, World on the Edge calls out the pivotal environmental issues and how to solve them now. We are in a race between political and natural tipping points. Can we close coal-fired power plants fast enough to save the Greenland ice sheet and avoid catastrophic sea level rise? Can we raise water productivity fast enough to halt the depletion of aquifers and avoid water-driven food shortages? Can we cope with peak water and peak oil at the same time? These are some of the issues Lester R. Brown skilfully distils in World on the Edge. Bringing decades of research and analysis into play, he provides the responses needed to reclaim our future.

Presenting case studies involving Rwanda, Nepal, Australia, Japan, and Mexico, including "real-time" policy and administrative questions, this versatile reference/text provides a wide perspective on national and international environmental problems and policies, featuring discussions with a regional emphasis as well as global significance. Pooling the work of over 60 international contributors in disciplines ranging from anthropology to political science, the Handbook of Global Environmental Policy and Administration illustrates how environmental concerns are incorporated into administrative functions and policy processes.

Every day, we are presented with a range of “sustainable” products and activities—from “green” cleaning supplies to carbon offsets—but with so much labeled as “sustainable,” the term has become essentially sustainababble, at best indicating a practice or product slightly less damaging than the conventional alternative. Is it time to abandon the concept altogether, or can we find an accurate way to measure sustainability? If so, how can we achieve it? And if not, how can we best prepare for the coming ecological decline? In the latest edition of Worldwatch Institute’s State of the World series, scientists, policy experts, and thought leaders tackle these questions, attempting to restore meaning to sustainability as more than just a marketing tool. In State of the World 2013: Is Sustainability Still Possible?, experts define clear sustainability metrics and examine various policies and perspectives, including geoengineering, corporate transformation, and changes in agricultural policy, that could put us on the path to prosperity without diminishing the well-being of future generations. If these approaches fall short, the final chapters explore ways to prepare for drastic environmental change and resource depletion, such as strengthening democracy and societal resilience, protecting cultural heritage, and dealing with increased conflict and migration flows. State of the World 2013 cuts through the rhetoric surrounding sustainability, offering a broad and realistic look at how close we are to fulfilling it today and which practices and policies will steer us in the right direction. This book will be especially useful for policymakers, environmental nonprofits, and students of environmental studies, sustainability, or economics.

After defining environmental crime and discussing the extent of the environmental crisis, this book explores the causes, investigation, prosecution and prevention of all types of environmental crime.

What it means for global sustainability when environmentalism is dominated by the concerns of the affluent—eco-business, eco-consumption, wilderness preservation. Over the last fifty years, environmentalism has emerged as a clear counterforce to the environmental destruction caused by industrialization, colonialism, and globalization. Activists and policymakers have fought hard to make the earth a better place to live. But has the environmental movement actually brought about meaningful progress toward global sustainability? Signs of global “unsustainability” are everywhere, from decreasing biodiversity to scarcity of fresh water to steadily rising greenhouse gas emissions. Meanwhile, as Peter Dauvergne points out in this provocative book, the environmental movement is increasingly dominated by the environmentalism of the rich—diverted into eco-business, eco-consumption, wilderness preservation, energy efficiency, and recycling. While it's good that, for example, Barbie dolls' packaging no longer depletes Indonesian rainforest, and that Toyota Highlanders are available as hybrids, none of this gets at the source of the current sustainability crisis. More eco-products can just mean more corporate profits, consumption, and waste. Dauvergne examines extraction booms that leave developing countries poor and environmentally devastated—with the ruination of the South Pacific island of Nauru a case in point; the struggles against consumption inequities of courageous activists like Bruno Manser, who worked with indigenous people to try to save the rainforests of Borneo; and the manufacturing of vast markets for nondurable goods—for example, convincing parents in China that disposable diapers made for healthier and smarter babies. Dauvergne reveals why a global political economy of ever more—more growth, more sales, more consumption—is swamping environmental gains. Environmentalism of the rich does little to bring about the sweeping institutional change necessary to make progress toward global sustainability.

Environmental policy is often practiced reactively with each crisis addressed as an isolated event. Focusing on development of proactive policies, Global Environment Policy: Concepts, Principles, and Practice provides the essential scientific and socioeconomic framework for formulating pragmatic and comprehensive environmental policies. It discusse

In this study, the award-winning environmental analyst Lester Brown and his colleagues have charted progress in building the eco-economy - an economy in harmony with the Earth's ecosystems, not undermining them. This edition of the biennial reader highlights 12 key trends, from population growing by 80 million annually, to ice melting, to the boom in use of solar cells. It explains, for example, why wind-generated electricity is emerging as the foundation of the new post-fossil fuel energy economy. It also specifically investigates China's desertification problem, the issues surrounding food production, and the challenge of controlling climate change. Drawing on research and analysis by the Earth Policy Institute, the reader monitors the shift from the old economy to the new.