The European waste framework directive encourages reuse, refurbishment and recycling of products and materials in order to reduce plastic waste. However, thousands of chemicals are used in plastic materials. Many of these are potentially toxic, and may cause hormonal and developmental disruption in children. This includes phthalates and short chain chlorinated paraffins, which are used as plasticizers and flame-retardants. European legal frameworks regulate the amounts of these substances in toys in an effort to protect children's health and safety.

We use three rounds of a rich panel data set to investigate the determinants of household cooking fuel choice and energy transition in urban Ethiopia. We observe that the expected energy transition did not occur following economic growth in Ethiopia during the decade 2000–2009. Regression results from a random effects multinomial logit model, which controls for unobserved household heterogeneity, show that households' economic status, price of alternative energy sources, and education are important determinants of fuel choice in urban Ethiopia.

This paper contributes to the growing literature on energy poverty in developing countries. We use a dynamic probit estimator on three rounds of panel data from urban Ethiopia to estimate a model of the probability of being energy poor and to investigate the persistence of energy poverty.

We use individual-level data to estimate the effects of long- and short-term exposure to air pollution (PM2.5) on the probability of dying from COVID-19. To the best of our knowledge, our study is the first to look at this relationship using individual-level data. We find that for Mexico City there is evidence of a positive relationship between pollution and mortality that significantly grows with age and that appears to be mostly driven by long- rather than short-term exposure.

Although there is an international obligation to reduce GHG from the transport sector by 2030, it appears that emissions, especially from heavy transport, continue to increase. In a project financed by NORDEN (Nordic Council of Ministers), measures for CO2-emissions from freight transport in the Nordic region, with emphasis on road transport, will be reviewed.

The project - Sustainable Nordic Cities with Focus on Climate-Smart Mobility - aims to contribute to sustainable urban development by supporting the transition to fossil-free transport and accessibility in Nordic cities and urban regions. The potential to organise the Nordic society to be more transport-efficient is significant, and the remaining transports must become increasingly fossil-free.

Environmental compensation (EC) aims at addressing environmental losses due to development projects and involves a need to compare development losses with compensation gains using relevant metrics. A conceptual procedure for computing no net loss is formulated and used as a point of departure for a comparative analysis of metrics used by five Swedish municipalities as a part of their EC implementation in the spatial planning context of detailed development plans.

Although rebound effects are well-known as a phenomenon, the question of how to avoid and minimize rebound effects have largely been ignored in practical policy. In this study, five concrete cases of measures and policies in the transport sector illustrate primary effects, rebound effects and possible strategies to avoid or minimize rebound effects. The cases were explored and analyzed in a series of workshops involving in total 15 researchers and societal actors.

According to the IPCC, changes to our lifestyles and behavior could result in a 40%–70% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. However, promoting impactful behavioral shifts through norms, policies, infrastructure, and technology remains challenging. This Voices asks: what must be considered to successfully guide low-carbon behavioral changes toward both sustainable and equitable outcomes?