Assessing the basic principles, structure and effectiveness of the international legal system concerning the protection of the world's natural environment, this text has been updated to take account of developments in genetically modified organisms and biotechnology.

Environmental justice is a significant and dynamic contemporary development in environmental law. Rechtschaffen, Gauna and new coauthor O'Neill provide an accessible compilation of interdisciplinary materials for studying environmental justice, interspersed with extensive notes, questions, and a teacher's manual with practice exercises designed to facilitate classroom discussion. It integrates excerpts from empirical studies, cases, agency decisions, informal agency guidance, law reviews, and other academic literature, as well as community-generated documents. This second edition includes new chapters addressing climate change, international environmental justice, and a capstone case study. It also adds expanded coverage of risk and the public health, empirical environmental justice research, and environmental justice for American Indian peoples.

This comprehensive volume of the Elgar Encyclopedia of Environmental Law provides an overview of the major elements of energy law from a global perspective. Based on an in-depth analysis of the energy chain, it offers insight into the impacts of climate change and environmental issues on energy law and the energy sector. This timely reference work highlights the need for modern energy law to consider environmental impacts and promote the use of clean energy sources, whilst also safeguarding a reliable and affordable energy supply.

The unprecedented expansion in environmental regulation over the past thirty years—at all levels of government—signifies a transformation of our nation's laws that is both palpable and encouraging. Environmental laws now affect almost everything we do, from the cars we drive and the places we live to the air we breathe and the water we drink. But while enormous strides have been made since the 1970s, gaps in the coverage, implementation, and enforcement of the existing laws still leave much work to be done. In The Making of Environmental Law, Richard J. Lazarus offers a new interpretation of the past three decades of this area of the law, examining the legal, political, cultural, and scientific factors that have shaped—and sometimes hindered—the creation of pollution controls and natural resource management laws. He argues that in the future, environmental law must forge a more nuanced understanding of the uncertainties and trade-offs, as well as the better-organized political opposition that currently dominates the federal government. Lazarus is especially well equipped to tell this story, given his active involvement in many of the most significant moments in the history of environmental law as a litigator for the Justice Department's Environment and Natural Resources Division, an assistant to the Solicitor General, and a member of advisory boards of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the World Wildlife Fund, and the Environmental Defense Fund. Ranging widely in his analysis, Lazarus not only explains why modern environmental law emerged when it did and how it has evolved, but also points to the ambiguities in our current situation. As the field of environmental law "grays" with middle age, Lazarus's discussions of its history, the lessons learned from past legal reforms, and the challenges facing future lawmakers are both timely and invigorating.

This textbook provides a concise introduction for students with little or no legal background, to the role of law in environmental protection. It describes and explains law and legal systems, the concept of the environment, sources of environmental law and some of the techniques used in environmental law. Interdisciplinary in approach, the book explores some of the major connections between law and the disciplines of ethics, science, economics and politics. Environment and Law offers a greater understanding of international and national environmental law and has case-studies from all over the world, including examples from UK, US and Australian law.

This comprehensive, current examination of U.S. law as it relates to global climate change begins with a summary of the factual and scientific background of climate change based on governmental statistics and other official sources. Subsequent chapters address the international and national frameworks of climate change law, including the Kyoto Protocol, state programs affected in the absence of a mandatory federal program, issues of disclosure and corporate governance, and the insurance industry. Also covered are the legal aspects of other efforts, including voluntary programs, emissions trading programs, and carbon sequestration.