Environmental Economics

Do EPA Defendents Prefer Republicans?

... is the title of an interesting-looking article in Economic Inquiry by Paul Hughes. Here is the abstract:

The election of George W. Bush as U.S. president in 2000, as measured by the Iowa Electronic Market (IEM), was associated with an increase of 3% in the share price of firms that were being sued by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). This is equal to approximately $100 billion of shareholder value. This finding is robust to a number of different specifications, controlling for other litigation, case law, and industry, and is not found in an otherwise similar sample of companies without litigation outstanding. It is suggested that the enforcement of environmental law is dependent on political pressure.

The NAS panel thinks that temperature trends look like ... a hockey stick ... with wider error bands

Is the hockey stick for real? The NAS panel says so:

A controversial paper asserting that recent warming in the Northern Hemisphere was probably unrivaled for 1,000 years was endorsed today, with a few reservations, by a panel convened by the nation's pre-eminent scientific body.

The panel said that a statistical method used in the 1999 study was not the best and that some uncertainties in the work "have been underestimated," and it particularly challenged the authors' conclusion that the decade of the 1990's was probably the warmest in a millennium.

But in a 155-page report, the 12-member panel convened by the National Academies said "an array of evidence" supported the main thrust of the paper. Disputes over details, it said, reflected the normal intellectual clash that takes place as science tests new approaches to old questions.

Check out the reactions at Climate Audit and RealClimate, should be fun.

Hazy Smokies

Don't go to the Smoky Mountains expecting clean, mountain air:

A pollution advisory was issued Thursday in Great Smoky Mountains National Park warning visitors of unhealthy levels of ground-level ozone.

...

At the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, ozone concentrations exceeding health standards were recorded overnight Wednesday at two higher elevation monitoring stations and conditions were expected to continue Thursday.

This would mark the third unhealthy day of the 2006 summer ozone season in the Smokies, the country's most visited national park on the Tennessee-North Carolina border.

I like my title, but does ozone=haze?

Crowding out in the hazards insurance market

Env-econ contributor Gloria Helfand comments on a recent piece in The Economists' Voice (Consider consumer side ...):

Even if people perceive the expected value of insurance correctly, the availability of disaster relief further reduces the desirability of purchasing insurance. Free assistance is clearly superior to costly insurance if it is easily obtained, and it gives people an incentive to under-insure their losses, or not to purchase insurance at all. It also reduces the incentive that insurance can provide to undertake mitigating activities, such as building with structural measures to withstand the worst effects of the hazard. There is no question that it is admirable that the general population is willing, through governments or private aid agencies, to assist with disaster recovery. It also reduces incentives to avoid disasters.

This sort of behavior always surprises me. If you live in a hurricane or other hazard-prone area, wouldn't you much rather make a claim with your insurance company instead of hoping that the government comes through with enough money to get you going again? But then, everyone has their own risk preference. Knowing that, I shouldn't be surprised when I read stories about the uninsured losing everything in this season's big hurricane.

Well, I did notice that my frozen margarita doesn't stay frozen quite as long...

Is it hot enough for you?  ABC News wants to hear your stories of pain and misery caused by global warming. 

Witnessing the impact of global warming in your life?

ABC News wants to hear from you. We're currently producing a report on the increasing changes in our physical environment, and are looking for interesting examples of people coping with the differences in their daily lives. Has your life been directly affected by global warming?

I'm not going to give any analysis...just sitting here in stunned silence.

One year stats

• Posts: 847 (mostly bad, poorly written or wrong-headed)
• Comments: 5121 (mostly Joshua and Dano)
• TrackBacks: 830 (mostly spam -- we've turned this "feature" off)

Notable events: June 21

On our 1-year anniversary, I thought I would list some notable events occuring on June 21, courtesy of Wikipedia.com...

At least 8 people are opposed to the Northwest Hawaiian Island National Monument

Last week, I broke the news that President Bush designated the Northwest Hawaiian Islands a National Monument--OK, I didn't really BREAK the news, but I was quick to find the story on the Washington Post website and repost it here, so I deserve some credit, right?  While hailed as a win for conservationists and conservatives, not everyone is happy:

The monument designation is not being welcomed by everyone in Hawaii. One consequence of the president's declaration is that within five years fishing in the area must cease.

Scoop the poop, damnit!

I've always had an aversion to scooping my dog's poop. I was fined by the condo association in Greenville, NC when she was a puppy (I wrote an obnoxious letter to the obnoxious condo association* claiming to have back problems) and I get fussed at by the neighboring vacation rental agency now that she is this close (imagine: John holding his thumb and index finger very close together) to cap T (as in t = 1, ..., T). I know it is wrong to leave her poop wherever she goes but I can't seem to make scooping the poop part of my daily routine.

At least I'm not alone (Dog excrement ...):

Almost half of North Carolina dog owners let the chips fall where they may and don't clean up after their animals, according to a statewide survey of how they handle their pets' waste.

More on my fav environmental problem (Google search www.env-econ.net for poop) on our one year anniversary:

Env-Econ one year anniversary

Congratulations to us on our one year anniversary! Who would've predicted that we would've made SO much money in one short year. Consider this: we've enjoyed 175,000+ site visits. At $1/visit, that amounts to over $200,000 in revenue (you've gotten used to my bad math, right?) and, since our opportunity cost of time is obviously approaching zero, almost $200,000 in profit. Split 60/40 (Tim gets 60% since he is taller), I'm clearing about $80,000!

Seriously, thanks to everyone who has contributed a post, book review, comment and/or trackback spam over the past year.

And thanks to everyone who has visited!