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Benjamin_Lyons comments on Notes on "The Limits to Growth" and surrounding material - Less Wrong
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I ask because as the costs of pollution rise, so might the benefits.
What are the benefits of pollution?
People don't pollute randomly. They pollute as a necessary by-product of other activities. There aren't, as far as I know, any benefits to pollution per se, but there are benefits to the sorts of activities that produce pollution. The costs of pollution may rise, but that doesn't imply that at any point the cost of pollution won't be worth it (except possibly on the margin due to the externality).
Ok, I understand what you're saying now. The matter under discussion is the negative externalities of pollution (perhaps to future generations). I don't know if there's enough Uranium or Plutonium for this to be a realistic hypothetical, but one could imagine a world in which nuclear reactor waste accumulated to such a degree so as to substantially reduce the amount of inhabitable land.