Resource and Energy Economics最新文献

This study investigates the effects of the introduction of a competitor on the behavior of an incumbent electricity producer who used to be a local monopolist. We especially focus on its implications for the incumbent's decision of capacity choice between two different electric power sources: one with a relatively high production cost (peak-load technology), which is represented by gas-fired power generation, and the other with a relatively high capacity-building cost (base-load technology), which is represented by nuclear power generation. We assume that the entrant does not have access to the latter technology, and also that demand fluctuates over time, as is typically the case with any electricity market. We show that the introduction of a competitor increases the capacity of nuclear power generation if and only if the nuclear power capacity is sufficiently costly to establish, in comparison with the marginal production cost of a gas-fired plant. This result also implies that the competition tends to decrease the nuclear capacity when the level of carbon tax, which raises the relative production cost of gas-fired power generation, is sufficiently high.

We provide a quantitative assessment of policy options to inform the 2021 review of the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) and raise climate ambition. We use a permit trading model in which firms utilize rolling finite planning horizons, which replicates historical price and banking developments well compared to an infinite horizon. When firms have bounded foresight, indirectly raising ambition through the Market Stability Reserve (MSR) is not equivalent to directly raising ambition through the emissions cap trajectory. Leveraging the MSR turns out to be efficiency improving as it compensates for firms’ bounded foresight by frontloading abatement efforts. We analyze the MSR interaction with the cap trajectory to exploit synergies and minimize the cost of raising ambition. We also provide a comparative assessment of a complete suite of changes in the MSR parameters. Whatever its parameters, MSR-induced resilience to demand shocks remains limited by design: the MSR acts more as an unconditional price support provider than as a responsive price stabilizer.

Rights-based management is prevalent in many fisheries, yet conventional spatiotemporal models of fishing behavior do not reflect such institutional settings. We adapt random utility maximization (RUM) models of spatiotemporal fishing behavior to capture the general equilibrium dynamics of catch-share fisheries by incorporating endogenously determined equilibrium quota prices. We demonstrate how a structural estimation strategy is capable of recovering policy-invariant behavioral parameters and predicting out-of-sample counterfactual policies. We illustrate the utility of our structural modeling approach by evaluating the efficacy of “ecosystem-based” policies, such as spatial closures, in a catch-share-managed fishery. Simulation results reveal that such policies have the potential to distort price signals in the quota market and prevent quota prices from coordinating fishing behavior in an efficient manner. Ecosystem-based policies may thus fall short of their intended objectives when introduced into rights-based managed fisheries. Importantly, we demonstrate that such conclusions cannot easily be drawn from behavioral models that omit or approximate the general equilibrium dynamics of rights-based fisheries.

A growing literature shows that weather conditions during gestation can have persistent impacts on education and income, especially among females. However, the consequences of these impacts on behavior and choices during adulthood are still under-explored. To shed light on this issue, I use survey data for over 200,000 households in Peru and find that average temperature during gestation affects fuel choice during adulthood among women, with extensive margin increases in the use of dirty cooking fuels, but no changes in the likelihood of fuel stacking. Analysis of the mechanisms suggests that female head’s income may be a more important driver than education. Supporting this argument, I show that the effects of in-utero temperature disappear among female beneficiaries of a conditional cash transfer program.

Measuring willingness to pay for non-market goods continues to be problematic for the benefit-cost analyst. This note presents a new procedure for placing a lower bound on that value. The measure identified herein offers the advantage of not requiring any assumptions that are not empirically verifiable, and can be taken using the market demand schedule for any good that has the quantity of the non-market good consumed as an argument.

An integrated hydro-economic agricultural land use model was developed with endogenous and spatially explicit crop planting, nitrogen (N) fertilizer use and irrigation in the Mississippi River Basin (MRB). We used the model to quantify the effects of energy and N fertilizer prices on N runoff to the Gulf of Mexico. Results show a modest effect of energy costs and a more substantive impact of N fertilizer costs on N delivered to the Gulf of Mexico. A 30 % reduction (increase) in N fertilizer price leads to a 3.5 % and 1.5 % increase (2.9 % and 1.5 % decrease) in N use and runoff, respectively. The model was also used to estimate the opportunity cost of N runoff abatement. The opportunity cost of reducing N runoff from crop production to the Gulf by 45 % is estimated to be $6 billion annually, which corresponds to an average cost of $29.3 per kg of N runoff reduction. The results show heterogeneities in the optimal N runoff reduction efforts across counties within the MRB, demonstrating the significance of a targeted abatement strategy.

Since the establishment of REDD+, hundreds of projects have emerged around the globe. Much attention has been given to REDD+ projects in the literature, but the conditions under which they are likely to be effective are still not well known. In particular, the location bias concept states that projects are more likely to be implemented in remote areas, where development pressure is low, hence questioning the additionality of these projects. In this article, we examine this concept, assessing how the status of REDD+ project proponents and the project certification influence the choice of location and the project's additionality. Using a sample of six REDD+ projects in Brazil, we show that these two dimensions can impact location choice toward areas with higher or lower opportunity costs and that this choice can impact additionality. We also show that the selection of an area with low opportunity costs, which is frequently presented as a location bias, does not necessarily preclude additionality.

In this paper, we reconsider the information problem of consumers who are concerned about the environment that was first identified by Mahenc, 2007, Mahenc, 2008. We obtain the result that Intuitive Criterion selects the unique equilibrium in which a seller producing eco-friendly products separates itself from the seller producing eco-unfriendly products by distorting its price from its first-best price upwards to the least costly degree. That is, a high price signals environmental friendliness. This is contrasted with the result of Mahenc (2007) who obtains the pooling equilibrium as the unique outcome (if the product is very likely to be eco-friendly) by using the concept of the undefeated equilibrium. We also examine the effect of the subsidy policy to promote consumptions of environmentally-friendly products by using Intuitive Criterion. Interestingly, a selective subsidy scheme can separate the high type from the low type but cannot provide the seller a strong enough incentive to invest in the environmental-friendly technology. We also show that if the motive of the monopolist, whether it is solely profit-maximizing or involves concerns for the environment, is its private information, a high price can signal the monopolist's environmental concerns and its voluntary choice of the eco-friendly technology.

All else equal, disparities in environmental exposure are associated with disparities in health and economic well-being. Here, we combine 9 years of data on toxic water pollution discharges from more than 1600 industrial facilities across urban Mexico with geographic, economic, and sociodemographic data from ≈ 50,000 Mexican urban block groups. We first show that industrial facilities pollute more in marginalized neighborhoods and in neighborhoods that are becoming more marginalized over time. In contrast, we find no evidence for relationships between toxic water pollution and indigenous race. We then explore channels driving observed exposure disparities. We find evidence that environmental disparities in urban Mexico are associated with collective action, community pressure, and Coasian bargaining. We do not find evidence consistent with political economic or amenity-based sorting mechanisms.

This paper considers firms’ incentives to merge under imperfect competition, where we allow for product differentiation, cost asymmetries, and pollution intensities (green and brown goods). We first analyze mergers in the absence of environmental regulation, showing that mergers induce an output shift towards the lowest cost firm. When emission fees are introduced, however, firms also consider their relative pollution intensities, potentially reverting the above output shift. We show that socially excessive mergers can arise when firms shift output to the more cost-efficient firm which may cause more pollution. In contrast, socially insufficient mergers can arise if output shifts reduce pollution.