Environmental Economics

Environmental economics is now encroaching on my enjoyment of football

From this week's Tuesday Morning Quarterback by Gregg Easterbrook--ESPN guest columnist and visiting fellow at The Brookings Institution:

Parking spaces and parking garages are not being made in sufficient numbers for a variety of reasons, including silly government regulations that discourage new parking slots when urban residential complexes are built and the market-forces problem that urban land is almost always more valuable as offices, retail space or housing than as any kind of parking, even paid parking. Now Donald Shoup, an urban planner at UCLA, has thrown a new idea into the topic. His book, "The High Cost of Free Parking," argues that the price of street parking should go way up and should reflect congestion fees depending on time of day.

Hmmmm...a follow-up to my call for road congestion pricing?  Maybe TMQ reads Env-Econ.

Climate quote of the day

"The time has come to stop looking back at the Kyoto Protocol.  The consequences of global climate change are so pressing ... it doesn't matter who was responsible for the past. What matters is who is answerable for the future. And that means all of us."

Governor and Terminator Arnold Schwarzenegger in an address to the U.N. conference on global warming

Economics 101

Here is another example of one of Prof. Whitehead's real pet peeves.  Even writers at The Economist screw this up.

the General

A cap and trade video at Terra Rossa

From the inbox:

We posted this video Monday, and I thought it may be of interest to you.  It runs for about 10 minutes, but is definitely worth watching [http://www.terrarossa.com/?p=225].

The true price of a gallon of gas is not the $3.00+ we pay at the pump, but is closer to $7.00 when you take into account the amount of U.S. tax-payer dollars spent to secure oil resources.

In a new video just released on our site (www.terrarossa.com), Retired four star general, Charles Wald speaks on the factors often left out of the cost of a gallon of gas.  The video, "Cap. Trade. Grow." also features President George H.W. Bush's EPA director, and a successful venture capitalist speaking on the importance of free-market solutions for energy independence.

Watching this made me feel like a conservative (shudder). No wonder the folks out there hate me when I say cap-and-trade isn't so bad compared to a carbon tax. For that reason, and my beautiful hair.

Text messaging? You be the judge

From The Ohio State Administration to all faculty at the beginning of the school year:

For the 13th consecutive year, Ohio State's freshman class ranks higher than any previous class with 53 percent ranking among the top 10 percent of their high school class and an average ACT score of 27.

The first e-mail I received from one of these elite students:

mr habb
I received and 80% on my first problem set this week end. Yea i know i should of waited and summited it after reviewing wit ji and mike. But is and 80% good for the first one. Is it still considered and  B

Teaching: a Coase theorem example

From the WSJ economics: micro weekly review:

The Right to Dry: A Green Movement Is Roiling America
by Anne Marie Chaker
Sep 18, 2007
Page: A1

TOPICS: Environmental Regulation, Externalities

SUMMARY: In an Oregon neighborhood, people who want to dry their laundry on a clothesline are fighting community rules that prohibit doing so. The battle is an unanticipated consequence of increasing environmental consciousness.

CLASSROOM APPLICATION: This article offers a good example of a tradeoff between two externalities: the unsightliness of laundry hung outside and the carbon emissions of generating electricity to operate clothes dryers.

QUESTIONS:
1.) Why do communities ban residents from drying clothes on clotheslines?

2.) What is the Coase Theorem? Discuss the possible inefficiency of bans on clotheslines in the context of the Coase Theorem.

3.) Pollution and carbon emissions are harmful and, to some, clothes on clotheslines are unsightly. Discuss the tradeoff between the externalities created operating clothes dryers and hanging wash on clotheslines.

REEP, v1, n2

The second issue of the Review of Environmental Economics and Policy, AERE's second journal, has been posted on the Oxford website:

http://reep.oxfordjournals.org/content/vol1/issue2/index.dtl

Remember, REEP "aims to fill the gap between traditional academic journals and the general interest press by providing a widely accessible yet scholarly source for the latest thinking on environmental economics and related policy."

Volume 1, number 2 features a Mortality-risk Valuation and Age symposium, several papers on economic analysis by the federal government and a paper on the status of women in environmental economics (abstract at RePEc).

One beef: I had signed up to the table of contents email alert service but I found out about the table of contents from Environmental Valuation & Cost-Benefit News. Gotta work on that Oxford!

Is command and control the most effective way to reduce GHG emissions?

From dictionary.com:

Dumbfounded: as if struck dumb with astonishment and surprise.

That pretty much sums up my reaction when I read this from the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP):

Regulation is the most effective means to achieve greenhouse gas emission reductions from buildings, a sector which accounts for some 30-40 % of global energy use.

Regulatory and control instruments such as building codes and appliance standards are the most effective way to increase energy efficiency, and so mitigate the industry's impact on global warming.

More benefits of climate change?

Not sure what to make of this:

Climate change may lead to lush growth rather than catastrophic tree loss in the Amazonian forests, researchers from the US and Brazil have found. A study, in the journal Science, found that reduced rainfall had led to greener forests, possibly because sunlight levels are higher when there are fewer rainclouds.

But scientists cautioned that while the finding raises hopes for the survival of the forests, there are still serious threats. Climate models have suggested that the forests will suffer as the region becomes drier and will release huge quantities of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

"researchers...found" Is that documented through data, or suggested by models?  "But scientists cautioned..."  Which scientists?  The same ones who found, or different ones who modeled?  I'm confused. 

A fantastic paper

If you are in the Boone, NC area around 2 pm today, feel free to stop by the economics seminar in Raley 3010 where you can see me present a fantastic paper:

Convergent Validity of Revealed and Stated Recreation Behavior with Quality Change: A Comparison of Multiple and Single Site Demands

You can download the paper at this link:

http://econ.appstate.edu/afantasticpaper.pdf

If you miss the seminar, we'll be in the Boone Saloon at 3:30 sharp.