Who speaks for the night? The regulation of light pollution in the ‘Rights of Nature’ legal framework
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Abstract
Efforts to control artificial light at night (ALAN) through public policies began in the late 1950s, yet light pollution continues to grow at a global average rate roughly twice that of population growth. The current global ALAN regulatory regime is clearly inadequate to solve the problem, and achieving meaningful light pollution reductions requires a new approach. This paper reviews the legal status quo, introduces the “Rights of Nature” doctrine, and advances the idea of nighttime darkness as a natural characteristic of sufficient inherent value to merit legal consideration in the Rights of Nature context. It concludes with a series of recommendations for ways forward, including the recognition of the intrinsic value of dark skies in the preambulatory language of legislation, formulating new policies in anticipation of broad adoption of Rights of Nature statutes, and advancing the significance of natural nighttime darkness in case law arguments.
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Keywords
light pollution, lighting policy, rights of nature
References
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[31] Gallaway, T. (2010). On Light Pollution, Passive Pleasures, and the Instrumental Value of Beauty. Journal of Economic Issues, 44(1), 71–88. doi:10.2753/jei0021-3624440104.
[32] Hamacher, D., De Napoli, K., Mott, B. (2019) Whitening the Sky: light pollution as a form of cultural genocide. Journal of Dark Sky Studies, 1. No doi.
[33] Boyd, D.R. (2017). The Rights of Nature: A Legal Revolution That Could Save the World. Toronto: ECW Press.
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[42] Stone, T. (2018). Re-envisioning the Nocturnal Sublime: On the Ethics and Aesthetics of Nighttime Lighting. Topoi. doi:10.1007/s11245-018-9562-4.
[43] Gallaway, T. (2014) The value of the night sky. In Meier, J., et al. (eds.), Urban Lighting, Light Pollution and Society, pp. 267–283. New York: Routledge.
[44] Simpson, S. N., Hanna, B. G. (2010). Willingness to pay for a clear night sky: use of the contingent valuation method. Applied Economics Letters, 17(11), 1095–1103. doi:10.1080/00036840902817508.
[2] Kyba, C., et al. (2017). Artificially lit surface of Earth at night increasing in radiance and extent. Science Advances, 3(11): e1701528. doi:10.1126/sciadv.1701528.
[3] Ackerman, D. (2014). The Human Age: The World Shaped by Us. Toronto: Harper Collins.
[4] Dalby, S. (2015). Framing the Anthropocene: The good, the bad and the ugly. The Anthropocene Review, 3(1), 33–51. doi:10.1177/2053019615618681.
[5] Rich, C. and Longcore, T., eds. (2005). Ecological consequences of artificial night lighting. Washington, D.C.: Island Press.
[6] Kyba, C., Hänel, A., Hölker, F. (2014). Redefining efficiency for outdoor lighting. Energy and Environmental Science, 7(6), 1806–1809. doi:10.1039/c4ee00566j.
[7] Steinbach, R., et al. (2015). The effect of reduced street lighting on road casualties and crime in England and Wales: controlled interrupted time series analysis. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 69(11). doi:10.1136/jech-2015-206012.
[8] Marchant, P. (2019). Do brighter, whiter street lights improve road safety? Significance, 16(5), 8–9. doi:10.1111/j.1740-9713.2019.01313.x.
[9] Luginbuhl, C., Walker, C., Wainscoat, R. (2009). Lighting and astronomy. Physics Today, 62(12), 32–37. doi:10.1063/1.3273014.
[10] Aubé, M. (2015). Physical behaviour of anthropogenic light propagation into the nocturnal environment. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London: Series B, 370, 20140117. doi:10.1098/rstb.2014.0117.
[11] Gallaway, T., Olsen, R., Mitchell, D. (2010). The economics of global light pollution. Ecological Economics, 69(3), 658–665. doi:10.1016/j.ecolecon.2009.10.003.
[12] Bará, S., Lima, R. (2018). Photons without borders: quantifying light pollution transfer between territories. International Journal of Sustainable Lighting, 20(2), 51–61. doi:10.26607/ijsl.v20i2.87.
[13] Riegel, K. (1973). Light Pollution: Outdoor lighting is a growing threat to astronomy. Science, 179(4080), 1285–1291. doi:10.1126/science.179.4080.1285.
[14] Portree, D. (2002). Flagstaff’s battle for dark skies. Griffith Observer, 66(10), 2-16. No doi.
[15] Downs, A. (1972). Downs, Anthony, Up and Down with Ecology-the Issue-Attention Cycle. Public Interest, 28, 38. No doi.
[16] McKenzie, R., et al. (2019). Success of Montreal Protocol Demonstrated by Comparing High-Quality UV Measurements with “World Avoided” Calculations from Two Chemistry-Climate Models. Scientific Reports, 9(1). doi:10.1038/s41598-019-48625-z.
[17] Montzka, S., et al. (2018). An unexpected and persistent increase in global emissions of ozone-depleting CFC-11. Nature, 557(7705), 413–417. doi:10.1038/s41586-018-0106-2.
[18] Howes, M., Wortley, L., Potts, R., Dedekorkut-Howes, A., Serrao-Neumann, S., Davidson, J., Smith, T., & Nunn, P. (2017). Environmental Sustainability: A Case of Policy Implementation Failure? Sustainability, 9(2), 165. doi:10.3390/su9020165.
[19] Morgan-Taylor, M. (2007). Light pollution and the UK law. Proceedings of the Dark-Skies Symposium, Portsmouth, UK September 15th-16th, 2006. British Astronomical Association Campaign for Dark Skies. No doi.
[20] Morgan-Taylor, M. (2014) Regulating Light Pollution in Europe: Legal Challenges and Ways Forward. In Meier, J., et al. (eds.), Urban Lighting, Light Pollution and Society, pp. 159-176. New York: Routledge.
[21] Barentine, J. (2021). National and Sub-National Laws, Bylaws and Ordinances. In Welch, D. (ed.), The World at Night: preserving natural darkness for heritage conservation and night sky appreciation. Best Practice Protected Area Guidelines. Gland, Switzerland: International Union for the Conservation of Nature. In press.
[22] Johnson, A. (2015). Blinded by the Light. Texas A&M Journal of Property Law, 2(3), 461–480. doi:10.37419/jpl.v2.i3.4.
[23] Ploetz, K. (2002). Light Pollution in the United States: An Overview of the Inadequacies of the Common Law and State and Local Regulation. New England Law Review, 36(4), 985-1039. No doi.
[24] Lystrup, D. (2017) The Dark Side of the Light: Rachel Carson, Light Pollution, and a Case for Federal Regulation, Jurimetrics, 57(4), 505–528. No doi.
[25] Garcia-Saenz, A., Sánchez de Miguel, A., Espinosa, A., Valentin, A., Aragonés, N., Llorca, J., Amiano, P., Martín Sánchez, V., Guevara, M., Capelo, R., Tardón, A., Peiró-Perez, R., Jiménez-Moleón, J. J., Roca-Barceló, A., Pérez-Gómez, B., Dierssen-Sotos, T., Fernández-Villa, T., Moreno-Iribas, C., Moreno, V., … Kogevinas, M. (2018). Evaluating the Association between Artificial Light-at-Night Exposure and Breast and Prostate Cancer Risk in Spain (MCC-Spain Study). Environmental Health Perspectives, 126(4), 047011. doi:10.1289/ehp1837.
[26] Garcia-Saenz, A., de Miguel, A. S., Espinosa, A., Costas, L., Aragonés, N., Tonne, C., Moreno, V., Pérez-Gómez, B., Valentin, A., Pollán, M., Castaño-Vinyals, G., Aubé, M., Kogevinas, M. (2020). Association Between Outdoor Light-at-night Exposure and Colorectal Cancer in Spain. Epidemiology, 31(5), 718–727. doi:10.1097/ede.0000000000001226.
[27] Schroer, S., Huggins, B. J., Azam, C., Hölker, F. (2020). Working with Inadequate Tools: Legislative Shortcomings in Protection against Ecological Effects of Artificial Light at Night. Sustainability, 12(6), 2551. doi:10.3390/su12062551.
[28] Lucas, G. (2017). Behavioral public choice and the carbon tax. Utah Law Review, 2017(1), 3, 115. No doi.
[29] Fang, C. (2018). Carbon Pricing: Correcting Climate Change’s Market Failure. Sustainability: The Journal of Record, 11(4), 162–166. doi:10.1089/sus.2018.0011.
[30] Kennedy, K., Obeiter, M., Kaufman, N. (2015). Putting a price on carbon: A handbook for U.S. policymakers. Working paper, World Resources Institute Brief, Washington, DC. http://wri.org/carbonpricing No doi.
[31] Gallaway, T. (2010). On Light Pollution, Passive Pleasures, and the Instrumental Value of Beauty. Journal of Economic Issues, 44(1), 71–88. doi:10.2753/jei0021-3624440104.
[32] Hamacher, D., De Napoli, K., Mott, B. (2019) Whitening the Sky: light pollution as a form of cultural genocide. Journal of Dark Sky Studies, 1. No doi.
[33] Boyd, D.R. (2017). The Rights of Nature: A Legal Revolution That Could Save the World. Toronto: ECW Press.
[34] Houck, O. (2017) Noah’s Second Voyage: The Rights of Nature as Law. Tulane Environmental Law Journal, 31(1), 1.
[35] Pecharroman, L. (2018). Rights of Nature: Rivers That Can Stand in Court. Resources, 7(1), 13. doi:10.3390/resources7010013.
[36] Sheehan, L. (2013). Realizing Nature's Rule of Law through Rights of Waterways. In Voigt, C. (ed.). Rule of Law for Nature: New Dimensions and Ideas in Environmental Law. United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.
[37] Cullinan, C. (2003). Wild Law: A Manifesto for Earth Justice. Totnes, UK: Green Books.
[38] Thiele, L. (2011). Indra's Net and the Midas Touch: Living Sustainably in a Connected World. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.
[39] Borràs, S. (2016). New Transitions from Human Rights to the Environment to the Rights of Nature. Transnational Environmental Law. 5(1): 113–143. doi:10.1017/S204710251500028X.
[40] Kauffman, C., Martin, P. (2019). How Courts Are Developing River Rights Jurisprudence: Comparing Guardianship in New Zealand, Colombia, and India". Vermont Journal of Environmental Law. 20(3).
[41] Bach, S., Degenring, F. (Eds.). (2015). Dark Nights, Bright Lights: Night, Darkness, and Illumination in Literature. Anglia Book Series, Vol. 50. Berlin: De Gruyter. doi:10.1515/9783110415292.
[42] Stone, T. (2018). Re-envisioning the Nocturnal Sublime: On the Ethics and Aesthetics of Nighttime Lighting. Topoi. doi:10.1007/s11245-018-9562-4.
[43] Gallaway, T. (2014) The value of the night sky. In Meier, J., et al. (eds.), Urban Lighting, Light Pollution and Society, pp. 267–283. New York: Routledge.
[44] Simpson, S. N., Hanna, B. G. (2010). Willingness to pay for a clear night sky: use of the contingent valuation method. Applied Economics Letters, 17(11), 1095–1103. doi:10.1080/00036840902817508.
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