Index of Leading Environmental Indicators: 2008 Report
By: Steven F. Hayward
This report provides important facts about California’s energy system, summarizes past policies, and investigates current policies that are receiving high levels of attention. For example, what effect do taxes have on consumption? Does mandated conservation work? Has state investment in alternative energy sources been beneficial?

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Index of Leading Environmental Indicators: 2007 Report
By: Steven F. Hayward, Amy Kaleita, Ph.D
As it has done over the past dozen years, the Index shines a spotlight on, and deepens Americans’ understanding of, environmental progress—the side of the environmental story that is seldom told. Positive trends are occurring in key areas such as national forests, air quality, toxic chemicals, and biodiversity.

An Inconvenient Truth or Convenient Fiction documentary

Index of Leading Environmental Indicators: 2006 Report
By: Steven F. Hayward
4.12.2006

Though 2005 offered a full plate of environmental episodes that riveted the world’s attention, including environmental calamities in China, Hurricane Katrina, and the U.N. conference on climate change, the march of environmental progress continues, according to the 2006 Index of Leading Environmental Indicators, released today by the Pacific Research Institute (PRI) and the American Enterprise Institute (AEI).

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This tenth edition of the Index of Leading Environmental Indicators is a good time to take stock of progress over the last decade. When the Index was launched, there were few efforts to develop environmental indicators or report trends in a useful way for the media or the public. Now there are dozens of worthy efforts in the public and private sector, many of them highly detailed and most available on the Internet. (An inventory of 86 Internet-accessible indicator sets is included in this ...

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The ninth annual Index of Leading Environmental Indicators, released today by the Pacific Research Institute and the American Enterprise Institute, shows that the environment continues to be America’s single greatest policy success. Environmental quality has improved so much, in fact, that it is nearly impossible to paint a grim, gloom-and-doom picture anymore.

In a dramatic turning point for environmental policy, the 2002 U.N. World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, South Africa affirmed that economic growth is a prerequisite for improving the world's environment. This should translate into a greater reliance on market-based policy solutions. However, many environmental issues remain as contentious as ever — climate change, sustainable development, food production, and urban growth.

We are pleased to present the 7th edition of our annual review of environmental trends and issues in the United States. The shape of environmental discourse has changed dramatically since the first edition of this report was published in 1994.

Public perception about the environment tends to run the gamut from alarm to hysteria. From most of the news headlines, the casual observer would think that we are doing everything wrong, and that nothing is going right. As Gregg Easterbrook wrote in his magisterial book A Moment on the Earth, “Environmental commentary is so fogbound in woe that few people realize measurable improvements have already been made in almost every area.” It is important that environmental trends be more ...

The Pacific Research Institute is pleased to present the fifth edition of the Index of Leading Environmental Indicators. The purpose of the Index is to provide policymakers and interested citizens with an annual checkup on environmental trends in the United States. It is especially propitious to do so this year, which marks the 30th anniversary of Earth Day on April 22.

The purpose of the Index of Leading Environmental Indicators is to provide policy makers and interested citizens with an annual checkup on environmental progress in the United States. “The environment” is a broad term, encompassing hundreds of discrete issues and concerns. The amount of data is overwhelming, making an exhaustive report truly exhausting for all but the dedicated specialist. It is for this reason that the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) annual reports on ...

Modem public attention to the environment dates roughly from the first Earth Day in 1970. But despite a generation of concern, public opinion about envi­ronmental issues remains confused and contradictory, and as a consequence public policy on the environment is highly contentious and unsettled.

The environment is a source of widespread anxiety and pessimism among the public and policy makers alike. Even though by most measures environmental quality has improved dramatically over the last 20 years, public opinion polls consistently show large majorities of the public are pessimistic about environmental quality. Leading politicians and environmental organizations, both of whom have a self-interest in being "crisis entrepreneurs," actively promote the idea that our future is in ...

Opinion polls consistently show that Americans believe the environment has deteriorated during their lifetimes, and will continue to get worse in the future, with detrimental consequences for public health and well being. Much of the public's perception of what ails the environment is driven by the relentless accumulation of anecdotes and the "crisis entrepreneurs" who exploit environmental problems. In fact, many aspects of environmental quality have improved dramatically since ...