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on Environmental Economics |
| By: | Benno Torglor |
| Abstract: | The paper investigates the relationship between pro-social norms and its implications for improved environmental outcomes, an area which has been neglected in the environmental economics literature. We provide empirical evidence, demonstrating a strong link between perceived environmental cooperation (reduced public littering) and increased voluntary environmental morale, using European Values Survey (EVS) data for 30 Western and Eastern European countries. The robust results suggest that environmental morale and perceived environmental cooperation, as well as identifying the factors that strengthen these relationships, potentially bring about better environmental outcomes. |
| Keywords: | environmental preferences, environmental morale, conditional cooperation, pro-social behavior |
| JEL: | H26 H73 D64 |
| Date: | 2007–06–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:qut:dpaper:220&r=env |
| By: | Francisco J. André (Department of Economics, Universidad Pablo de Olavide); M. Alejandro Cardenete (Department of Economics, Universidad Pablo de Olavide); Carlos Romero (Departamento de Economía y Gestión Forestal, Escuela Tecnica Superior de Ingenieros de Montes, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid.) |
| Abstract: | Economic policy needs to pay more attention to environmental issues. This calls for the development of methodologies capable of incorporating environmental as well as macroeconomic goals in the design of public policies. In view of this, this paper proposes a methodology based upon Simonian satisficing logic implemented with the help of goal programming models to address the joint design of macroeconomic and environmental policies. The methodology is applied to the Spanish economy, where a joint policy is elicited, taking into account macroeconomic goals (economic growth, inflation, unemployment, public deficit) and environmental goals (CO2, NOx and SOx emissions) within the context of a computable general equilibrium model. |
| Keywords: | Environmental policies, goal programming, macroeconomic policies, computable general equilibrium model, multiple criteria decision making, satisficing logic. |
| JEL: | C61 C68 Q58 |
| Date: | 2007–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pab:wpaper:07.12&r=env |
| By: | McManus, Walter |
| Abstract: | A growing majority of climate scientists are convinced that unless emissions are reduced, global warming would cause a number of adverse effects throughout the United States. In California, rising temperatures would reduce the snow pack in the Sierra-the state's primary source of water-and lead to less water for irrigating farms in the Central Valley. Global warming would increase the number of extreme heat days and greatly increase the risk of poor air quality across the state. California's 1,100 miles of coastline and coastal communities are vulnerable to rising sea levels. Concerted action could curb global warming, but all sectors would need to take immediate steps to reduce heattrapping pollution. In California, the transportation sector consumes well over half the oil used statewide, and passenger cars and trucks emit 20 to 30 percent of the state's global warming pollution. Vehicles therefore are a central focus of the immediate action required to reduce global warming. The state of California's regulatory approach involves phasing in limits to average global warming emissions from passenger cars and trucks beginning in 2009 and culminating in 2016. This regulation is often called "Pavley," after its author, Assemblywoman Fran Pavley. The federal government's approach provides tax incentives to buyers of hybrid vehicles, which emit significantly lower amounts of global warming pollution than most conventional vehicles. However, the hybrid incentive affects only a small portion of the vehicle market. A third approach that could be used to enhance or replace existing regulations would be a feebates program. A feebates program creates a schedule of both fees and rebates that reflects the amount of global warming pollution that different vehicles emit. Purchasers of new vehicles that emit larger amounts of heat-trapping emissions pay a one-time surcharge at the point of purchase. These surcharges are then used to provide rebates to buyers of new vehicles that emit less pollution. A feebates program has several advantages over other approaches: Market-oriented: A feebates program recognizes the power of price signals to change consumer behavior. That is, incentives spur consumers to purchase and manufactures to produce cleaner vehicles. Self-financing: A feebates program can be designed so that the surcharges collected equal the rebates paid. Affects entire market: A feebates program applies to all new vehicles-clean and dirty-spurring a transformation of the entire market. Consumer choice: A feebates program can be designed so that consumers have the option to buy vehicles that carry no surcharge in each vehicle class, such as cars, trucks, sport utility vehicles (SUVs), and minivans. This study explores the economic impacts on consumers and manufacturers of the existing Pavley regulation and a feebates program by analyzing four alternative scenarios, using information from 2002 as the base year. Our findings show that a feebates program is an effective strategy to reduce global warming pollution by up to 25% more than Pavley alone. Also, under a feebates program consumers will save thousands of dollars and retailers will see their revenue rise by as much as 6%. |
| Keywords: | automotive industry; feebates; greenhouse gases; vehicle emissions; public policy |
| JEL: | Q52 Q58 L62 |
| Date: | 2007–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:3461&r=env |
| By: | Onno Hoffmeister; Reimund Schwarze |
| Abstract: | The German Environmental Liability Law (ELL) of 1991 has introduced far-reaching civil liability for environmental damages with the aim to increase firms’ efforts to prevent accidents. Previous studies find poor evidence that this goal has actually been achieved. One and a half decades after the introduction of that law, we undertake a new attempt to investigate the impact of the ELL on accident prevention. Our analysis is based on annual data on the number of environmental accidents per year, reported to the monitoring agency ZEMA, and the risk premium imposed by a large German insurer on environmental liability insurance (ELI). As reliable accident reporting has begun only after the implementation of the new law into practice, pre- and post-reform levels of accident prevention cannot be directly compared. However, the time series of ELI premiums cuts across these two periods. Once we examine the relationship between the ELI premium and accident prevention and observe the effect of the reform impulse on the former, we are able to model the dynamics of the adjustment process induced by the ELL. According to our results, the average number of environmental accidents per year has decreased from 29 before to 17 and a half after the reform. Our dynamic analysis reveals an overshooting of the insurance premiums in the first years after the reform and a successive decrease from 1997 onwards. The premiums and firms’ prevention efforts achieved a new equilibrium in 2000. |
| Keywords: | Environmental liability, accident prevention, empirical analysis, Germany. |
| JEL: | K32 K13 Q58 |
| Date: | 2007–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:inn:wpaper:2007-11&r=env |
| By: | André de Palma (University of Cergy-Pontoise and Ecole Nationale de Ponts et Chaussées, France); Kiarash Motamedi (University of Cergy-Pontoise, France); Nathalie Picard (University of Cergy-Pontoise, France); Paul Waddell (University of Washington, USA) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we examine empirically the market for local amenities in the Paris metropolitan region. We find first that there is considerable inequality in the spatial distribution of these local amenities, including accessibility, environmental and social indicators. We use a spatial representation and Lorenz curves to examine the degree of inequality in these amenities, and this provides evidence that some amenities (or disamenities) are much more inequitably distributed than others. The most extremely unequally distributed amenities are noise (due to its concentration near airports), “Redevelopment Areas”, presence of water (lakes and rivers) and forests, and presence of train and subway stations. Some indicators, such as the “Poulit accessibility” measure, were by contrast remarkably constant over the region. We recognize that local amenities should be capitalized into the housing market, and explore the willingness to pay of households for these amenities within the Paris region using alternative specifications of a location choice model. One of the core questions we examine is the spatial scale of the amenity effects and how this is captured in a location choice context. By estimating models at both a commune and at a grid cell level, we obtain new insights into how households in the Paris region trade off amenities against each other and against housing cost. We find that the residential location choice model fits the data moderately better at the smaller scale of the grid cell compared to the commune. |
| Keywords: | Inequality, efficiency, local public goods, residential location, integrated model, transportation modelling, Paris area. |
| JEL: | R23 R41 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ema:worpap:2007-16&r=env |
| By: | Pamela Kaval (University of Waikato) |
| Abstract: | Over 90 percent of people living in the United States participate in some type of outdoor recreation, from walking the dog to rock climbing. These activities increase a person’s well-being and are examples of recreation benefits. These benefits can be measured by using a variety of available techniques to calculate consumer surplus values. Consumer surplus values for recreation in U.S. parks were collated from an extensive literature review. Studies conducted between 1967 and 2003 yielded over 1,200 observations of non-market benefits. From this meta-analysis, it was determined that an average day of recreation in U.S. parks provide people with a non-market benefit of $60.50/day (2006 US$). With an estimated 924 million visitor days, the benefit of outdoor recreation on federal park lands during 2006 was estimated at $54.7 billion dollars. This analysis did not include state, county, and city parks, and hence the total benefit of outdoor recreation in all U.S. parks would be significantly higher. |
| Keywords: | outdoor recreation; consumer surplus; non-market benefits; United States Parks |
| JEL: | Q26 |
| Date: | 2007–07–20 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wai:econwp:07/12&r=env |
| By: | Joanna Hendy (Motu Economic and Public Policy Research); Suzi Kerr (Motu Economic and Public Policy Research); Troy Baisden (GNS Science) |
| Abstract: | This paper documents the first version of the Land Use in Rural New Zealand Model (LURNZv1). It describes the overall modelling approach, the database underlying the model, and the construction of each module within the model. The model is econometrically estimated from national time series data and spatially extrapolated using economic and geophysical variables. It is primarily a simulation model but is also set up to produce predictions based on future price scenarios. The model output includes projections of four types of rural land use under different scenarios and 25 ha grid maps of where land use, and changes in land use, are likely to occur. |
| Keywords: | simulation model, land use, dairy, sheep, beef, forestry, reverting indigenous forest |
| JEL: | C88 Q25 Q28 R14 |
| Date: | 2007–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mtu:wpaper:07_07&r=env |
| By: | Américo M. S. Carvalho Mendes (Faculdade de Economia e Gestão, Universidade Católica Portuguesa (Porto)) |
| Date: | 2007–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cap:wpaper:132007&r=env |
| By: | Christos Koulovatianos; Carsten Schröder; Ulrich Schmidt |
| Abstract: | We study the impact of uncertainty on the strategies and dynamics of symmetric noncooperative games among players who exploit a non-excludable resource that reproducesunder uncertainty. We focus on a particular class of games that deliver a unique Nash equilibrium in linear-symmetric strategies of resource exploitation. We show that, for this class of games, the tragedy of the commons is always present. For various changes in the riskiness of the random primitives of the model we provide general characterizations of features of the model that explain links between the degree of riskiness and strategic exploitation decisions. Finally, we provide a specific example that demonstrates the usefulness of our general results and, within the specific example, we study cases where increases in risk amplify or mitigate the tragedy of the commons. |
| JEL: | C73 C72 C61 Q20 O13 D90 D43 |
| Date: | 2007–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:vie:viennp:0703&r=env |
| By: | Américo M. S. Carvalho Mendes (Faculdade de Economia e Gestão, Universidade Católica Portuguesa (Porto)) |
| Date: | 2007–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cap:wpaper:122007&r=env |