This is the same as measuring developer productivity by counting lines of code: perfectly objective, but worse than useless.

Millions of tonnes of any waste released into the environment, no matter how "harmless", are too much. Humanity needs to tackle its waste problem, and that soon, or we are going to drown our kids in trash. Or, given that nitrates (which aren't that toxic per se) are the 3rd position in weight are perfect food for algae, we're drowning them in algae and without fish.

Not to mention that much of the stuff that gets released in huge quantities can actually be used as a natural resource. Instead of capturing and using it we're throwing all the stuff away.

Therefore, any way of looking at the environmental issues is good - anything that can be tackled should be tackled.

This is a terrible idea. People have repeatedly shown they are willing to give up very little to address environmental problems. That makes it even more important that when we use limited social capital to address a problem, it's the most important problem that can be addressed.

> when we use limited social capital to address a problem

Let an actual free and fair market solve it. When externalities have to be included in pricings (be it insurance premiums for superfund cleanup, earmarked money in trusts for cleanup, or simply preventing emissions in the first place) instead of having them shouldered by society, the market will by itself weed out companies doing excessive environmental damage.

> Let an actual free and fair market solve it.

Ideally, yes, but that's like saying "we'll just use nuclear fusion to meet our energy needs."

Or: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assume_a_can_opener

That seems like a convoluted definition of "free market". For that to work there needs to be some agreed upon definition of what effects are considered "externalities" and there also needs to be an enforcement mechanism. There's no way that's going to be handled other than central planning.

> the market will by itself weed out companies doing excessive environmental damage

Do you have any data to support this fairytale?

I see the logic in what you are saying but I wonder if it would just lead to a situation where every problem just becomes, "not severe enough to warrant attention". I've sort of seen this with opposition to environmental regulations being opposed on the grounds that it "costs too much money".

But if you are implying that productivity is analoguous to toxicity, then in this case no statement was made on toxicity. It was left out, so it's like just counting lines of code without associating it with productivity. So maybe it's less useful on the surface, but it's also more accurate raw data that others could remix into their own solutions and conclusions.

It's worse than meaningless because it distracts from more damaging issues because "Wow! Heavy!"

If I have 10kg of mercury and I dump it in a river, that measures 10kg of toxic waste.

But if I have pile of 10 million kg of rock that contains 1kg of mercury, it's reported as a million times worse for 1 tenth the toxin.

What you want is weight divided by the LD50 dose of that toxin.

Less toxic stuff will have a lower rating per pound, while more toxic stuff would kill more people per unit of weight.