Editor's Note

• Author: Veronica Kennedy
• Pages: 2-2

Rising: The Story of How a Tiny Community in Southern

Louisiana Will Save the Largest Delta in North America

by Professor Lewyn and Mr. Hudson, respectively, have a

domestic U.S. focus. Professor Lewyn’s article analyzes how a

well-intentioned statute has triggered increased consumption

worsening New York State’s impact on the environment, while

Mr. Hudson’s article highlights how poor implementation poli-

cies related to improved technology wreaked havoc on a small

town in Louisiana.

As each attempts to analyze an IPAT variable, these articles

illustrate just how complex the human impact on the environ-

ment is and how challenging it can be to create, follow, and cor-

rect the laws and policies we adopt to reduce that impact.

I would like to thank our authors for contributing intrigu-

ing work to the study of sustainable development law and

policy. Their scholarship is an inspiration to us all as we search

to understand how to improve our livelihoods and maintain a

healthy planet. Lastly, I owe a debt of gratitude to my staff who

works tirelessly to make this publication thrive.

2Sustainable Development Law & Policy

In the 1970s, Barry Commoner, Paul Ehrlich, and John

Holdren —preeminent scientists who helped spur the mod-

ern environmental movement—created a simple equation

to determine human environmental impact: impact (I) is equal

to the product of population (P), aff‌luence (A), and technology

(T).1 More specif‌ically, the population of an area multiplied by

its consumption per capita and the resource requirements of cre-

ating, transporting, and disposing of the goods and services that

make up the population’s consumption equals that population’s

environmental impact. As such, to merely maintain the rate of

our impact on the environment as population grows, our con-

sumption must decrease and/or we must create, use, and dispose

of technology more eff‌iciently.

The IPAT equation has justif‌iably been criticized as overly

simplistic because population, aff‌luence, and technology are

not mutually exclusive factors. For example, if a technology,

like a cell phone, is created using half the natural resources, the

environmental impact is not necessarily reduced by half if that

increase in eff‌iciency also reduces the price of the cell phone

spurring increased consumption by the population. Population,

aff‌luence, and technology are nonetheless important factors

to consider when molding environmental policies and law to

improve sustainable development across the globe. Although

imperfect, this equation still provides signif‌icant insight into the

basic roots of current environmental problems.

In this latest issue of Sustainable Development Law and

Policy, our article authors highlight the inf‌luence of the IPAT fac-

tors on law and policy and the inf‌luence of law and policy on these

factors. Professor Hardaway’s article, As the World Welcomes its

Seven Billionth Human: Ref‌lections and Population, Law, and

the Environment, is the focal point of this issue, highlighting

each factor of the IPAT formula and the overwhelming impact

population has on the environment.

Two articles, U.S. Food Aid Reform through Alternative

Dispute Resolution by Ms. Griswold and Indonesia’s Role in

Realizing the Goals of ASEAN’s Agreement on Transboundary

Haze Pollution by Mr. Jerger, take an international look at

policies that can be used today to reduce environmental impacts

created by problematic consumption that is dependent on popu-

lation and technology, respectively.

Case-study specif‌ic articles, How Environmental Review

Can Generate Car-Induced Pollution: A Case Study and Laplace

EDITOR'S NOTE

FEATURES:

15 | OVERSIGHT AND ACCOUNTABILITY OF

WATER PRIVATIZATION CONTRACTS:

A PROPOSED LEGISLATIVE POLICY

by Mary Strayhorne

34 | GENETICALLY MODIFIED FOOD:

A GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY?

by Susan Johnson

46 | ARTICLE XX: PROTECTOR OF PUBLIC HEALTH,

THE ENVIRONMENT, AND THE NEW PROVISIONS

OF EUROPEAN UNION'S FUEL QUALITY DIRECTIVE

by Joy Marie Virga

Veronica Kennedy

1 See Marian R. Chertow, The IPAT Equation and Its Variants: Changing

Views of Technology and Environmental Impact, 4 J. INDUS. ECOLOGY 13, 15-18

(2001).