How can behavioural insights help tackle environmental problems?

Behavioural biases can affect the outcomes of policies aiming to tackle environmental problems. This chapter provides examples of such behavioural biases and explains how behavioural insights can inform policy making in this realm. It provides a typology of behavioural levers that can act as complements for traditional environmental policy tools. It then synthesises the main lessons learnt from behavioural interventions implemented by governments in a range of policy areas: energy, water and food consumption, transport and car choice, waste management and resource efficiency, compliance with environmental regulation and participation in voluntary schemes. It concludes with an overview of the cross-cutting issues in the application of behavioural insights to environmentally relevant policy, and proposes directions for future applications.