Download or read book The British Experience with River Pollution, 1865-1876 written by Lawrence E. Breeze and published by Peter Lang Gmbh, Internationaler Verlag Der Wissenschaften. This book was released on 1993 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides a historical account of two Royal Commissions in Victorian Britain that sought solutions to river pollution problems attributed to industrial waste and town sewage. It describes and analyzes the legislative outcome, the Rivers Pollution Act of 1876, which remained the basic law until 1951. An introductory chapter and an epilogue place developments of the 1860's and 1870's into the broader context of British history. The study dispels any notion that environmental issues are largely twentieth-century phenomena. Two themes recur in the general response to the work of the commissions: fear of the economic consequences of adopting anti-pollution measures and a stubborn attachment to local control.