At the October 1996 meeting of the Section on Business Law of the International Bar Asscoaition, Committee J presented a programme on environmental issues in insolvency proceedings. The success of the programme encouragd the participants to expand their papers into this volume, which offers an up-to-date current analysis of the treatment of environmental issues in bankruptcy and insolvency proceedings in six jurisdictions: Canada, Denmark, Germany, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States.