Public access to environmental information: Past, present and future

Since the late 1960s and the environmental revolution, information and information systems have been an integral part of the environmental debate. In the decade that has passed since the Rio conference and the establishment of the sustainable development principle, there have been legislative and practical moves to open access to environmental information for all stakeholders that are involved in environmental decision making processes. In this paper, the origins of environmental information and public environmental information systems are explored and scrutinised. The paper questions the current state of the art in environmental information provision, and offers some directions for possible improvements. © 2002 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.