Measuring Environmental Risk

Environmental issues and risk have become central in socioeconomic research and policy planning inorder to ensure sustainable development. As environmental risk is difficult to assess and measure, differentindexes have been developed to evaluate specific aspects of such risk. Environmental risk typically involvesproblems generated by the consumption of energy (fuels), water shortages, disasters, global warming, poverty, andpopulation growth. Environmental indexes are typically disaggregated and deal with separate aspects ofenvironmental risk. Some useful overall indexes exist, such as the Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI). Thispaper reviews the existing data and indexes for environmental risk.