Danger: Hazardous stocks.

The article focuses on the future of environmental companies, in the U.S., going public at a rapid pace. The waste and pollution control is expected to be a $200 billion industry by 1994. Less than half of the 61 environmental companies have outperformed the S&P 500 since their initial offering. Industry stalwarts like Waste Management, Browning-Ferris and Chambers Development have already made big money in the environmental business, and they can be judged by more conventional benchmarks, including quarterly changes in earnings. But with the fledgling companies, it isn't always so. It can take years to translate environmental legislation into sales and profits. Most of the players in the environmental business today are local or regional, working in particular niches of the business. Though they may have high hopes of expanding nationally or moving into other areas of pollution control, the fact is that few so far have succeeded.