The UK Environmental Law Association (UKELA) holds a conference each year to bring together academics and practitioners,lawyers and environmental experts from other disciplines – within both science and social science. It is a unique event providing a forum for discussion of the most pressing issues of environmental regulation, and provides a unique combination of analysis and practical application. These articles, presented as papers at the Cardiff Conference in 2001, provide an accessible and informative collection addressing the conference theme of economics, ethics and the environment, including such issues as: how we can use traditional economic devices such as taxation, trading and insurance to assist in environmental regulation; how we treat and protect the natural world; how we might cope with the growing problem of waste; and how we should react to safeguard the environment in the face of risks and scientific uncertainties. The collection forms a topical and wide ranging discussion of key issues for legal practitioners, academics and students and will also be of great interest to a wider range of disciplines relating to the environment.