Carrots and sticks for new technology: Abating greenhouse gas emissions in a heterogeneous and uncertain world

Many governments use technology incentives as an important component of their greenhouse gas abatement strategies. These carrots are intended to encourage the initial diffusion of new, greenhouse-gas-emissions-reducing technologies, in contrast to carbon taxes and emissions trading which provide a stick designed to reduce emissions by increasing the price of high-emitting technologies for all users. Technology incentives appear attractive, but their record in practice is mixed and economic theory suggests that in the absence of market failures, they are inefficient compared to taxes and trading. This study uses an agent-based model of technology diffusion and exploratory modeling, a new technique for decision-making under conditions of extreme uncertainty, to examine the conditions under which technology incentives should be a key building block of robust climate change policies. We find that a combined strategy of carbon taxes and technology incentives, as opposed to carbon taxes alone, is the best approach to greenhouse gas emissions reductions if the social benefits of early adoption sufficiently exceed the private benefits. Such social benefits can occur when economic actors have a wide variety of cost/performance preferences for new technologies and either new technologies have increasing returns to scale or potential adopters can reduce their uncertainty about the performance of new technologies by querying the experience of other adopters. We find that if decision-makers hold even modest expectations that such social benefits are significant or that the impacts of climate change will turn out to be serious then technology incentive programs may be a promising hedge against the threat of climate change.     

China''s energy, environment and policy perspective

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机动车尾气的产生及对人群健康的影响和防治对策

较详细的介绍了机动车燃料和尾气的关系，全面论述了尾气中主要污染物对人体健康的危害，并对防治尾气的污染提出了建议。     

Faunal loss from bushmeat hunting: empirical evidence and policy implications in Bioko Island

Bushmeat market data can be used to detect hunting sustainability by using proxies such as decline in sale volume and price increases over time. Here, we explore these proxies for the Malabo market in Bioko Island, Equatorial Guinea, the main bushmeat sale centre for the island. We gathered data during two sample phases (we call these ‘early’ and ‘later’) between March 1996 and October 1998, to test for evidence of faunal depletion during that period. Mammals (ungulates, rodents and primates) made up most of the bushmeat sold. Our analyses confirmed significant and sudden, rather than continuous, declines between phases, in total and individual animal group carcass volumes. Market species composition differed between phases; diversity indices and evenness increased in the later phase of the study. Price was related to species body mass and carcass condition (whether the carcass was smoked or fresh). Most species prices were higher in the later phase of the study. A total of 33 sites contributed bushmeat to the market, with over half of the recorded volume emerging from five sites in the south of the island. Bushmeat volume supplied from different regions of the island varied significantly between phases, and fewer sites contributed animals to the market during the later phase of the study. Proportionately more primates, ungulates but fewer rodents, appeared in the southern samples, compared with the northern. We suggest that in just over 2 years, hunting incursions, especially into the south of the island, may have resulted in drastic faunal losses. Subsequent data, collected by other authors, also indicate that the hunting spurt in the mid- and late-1990s may have irreversibly imperilled the island's mammalian fauna, since numbers of these animals entering the market have not increased since our study period. Although the Equato-Guinean authorities have recently initiated mechanisms to better protect the country's wildlife, through various legal and funding instruments, we suggest that these initiatives are likely to fail, if the social and environmental linkages are not fully understood to guide immediate restoration of such a unique African faunal assemblage.     

Welfare policy: A review

This paper reviews the literature on disaster welfare policy. Analysis of the Australian disaster welfare response shows the different functions of government and voluntary welfare agencies.     

水中触电危险性浅析及对策研究

通过典型事故案例分析,针对具有水中触电危险场所及极度潮湿场所触电事故多发、隐患严重以及相关技术标准不健全的现状,对水中触电危险性及预防这一课题进行了初步分析与研究,通过实验,初步了解了水的导电特性以及在带电的水中电压、电位差分布状况;对人体在带电的水中受到电击时的电压分布,触电电流走向进行了分析。笔者提出多项改进措施,在接地、接零系统中采用大幅度降低保护零线阻抗和重复接地电阻值以及加强等电位措施,正确使用漏电开关及安全隔离变压器等方法。上述改进措施具有一定的实用价值和可操作性,从而解决具有水中触电危险场所及极度潮湿场所的电气安全问题。     

On the Design of Computer-Based Models for Integrated Environmental Science

The current research agenda in environmental science is dominated by calls to integrate science and policy to better understand and manage links between social (human) and natural (nonhuman) processes. Freshwater resource management is one area where such calls can be heard. Designing computer-based models for integrated environmental science poses special challenges to the research community. At present it is not clear whether such tools, or their outputs, receive much practical policy or planning application. It is argued that this is a result of (1) a lack of appreciation within the research modeling community of the characteristics of different decision-making processes including policy, planning, and (2) participation, (3) a lack of appreciation of the characteristics of different decision-making contexts, (4) the technical difficulties in implementing the necessary support tool functionality, and (5) the socio-technical demands of designing tools to be of practical use. This article presents a critical synthesis of ideas from each of these areas and interprets them in terms of design requirements for computer-based models being developed to provide scientific information support for policy and planning. Illustrative examples are given from the field of freshwater resources management. Although computer-based diagramming and modeling tools can facilitate processes of dialogue, they lack adequate simulation capabilities. Component-based models and modeling frameworks provide such functionality and may be suited to supporting problematic or messy decision contexts. However, significant technical (implementation) and socio-technical (use) challenges need to be addressed before such ambition can be realized.     

From Environmental Ethics to Nature Conservation Policy: Natura 2000 and the Burden of Proof

Natura 2000 is a network of natural sites whose aim is to preserve species and habitats of relevance in the European Union. The policy underlying Natura 2000 has faced widespread opposition from land users and received extensive support from environmentalists. This paper addresses the ethical framework for Natura 2000 and the probable moral assumptions of its main stakeholders. Arguments for and against Natura 2000 were analyzed and classified according to “strong” or “weak” versions of the three main theories of environmental ethics – anthropocentrism, biocentrism, and ecocentrism. Weak (intergenerational) anthropocentrism was found to underlie the Natura 2000 network itself and the positions of environmentalists, while strong (traditional) anthropocentrism pervaded the positions of economic developers. Land users seemed to fall somewhere between weak and strong anthropocentrism. The paper discusses the relation between ethics and different attitudes towards Natura 2000, highlighting some of the implications for the network’s ongoing implementation. It is shown that Natura 2000 achieves a strong reversal of the burden of proof from conservation to economic development and land use change under anthropocentrism. It is argued that the alleged theoretical divide between anthropocentrism and non-anthropocentrism in relation to the burden of proof does not seem to hold in practice. Finally, it is predicted that the weak versions of anthropocentrism, biocentrism, and ecocentrism, are likely to converge extensively in respect to nature conservation policy measures.“Charting the depths of law and policy disputes yield an understanding of ethical differences.” Paul B. Thompson (2002, p. 189).     

Ecological Conservation Through Aesthetic Landscape Planning: A Case Study of the Lower Wisconsin State Riverway

A consequence of expanding residential development into rural areas is the potential alteration of ecological communities. Certain novel land-use policies seek practical solutions by accommodating social needs for housing while conserving biodiversity. This study investigates whether regulations designed to protect the aesthetic characteristics of a river corridor simultaneously mitigate negative effects of development on avian biodiversity, despite the absence of explicit conservation objectives. Using housing data from the US Census (1990 and 2000) and the Audubon Christmas Bird Count (1987–2000), we examined changes in housing density, avian communities, and the relationship between these two variables in a location that has adopted aesthetic landscape planning, the Lower Wisconsin State Riverway. We found that overall species diversity increased in the Riverway, but remained constant in reference areas, although the relative increase in housing density in the two areas did not differ. We also found that omnivore populations decreased in the Riverway and increased in reference sites. On the whole, our study provides preliminary evidence that aesthetic landscape planning, such as employed in the Lower Wisconsin State Riverway, might constitute a politically viable approach to conserve ecological resources.     

Toward an integrative approach of the industrial risk management process in France

Management in the field of environmental protection and risk prevention has evolved to the increasing participation of all stakeholders in the decision-making process. It certainly results from the development of the Information society and the global increase of knowledge of the population, combined with the concerns of the populations related to a sustainable development of our civilisation. Our ‘risk society’, following the big industrial disasters (Flixborough,Tchernobyl, Bhopal, Challenger, and more recently Toulouse), has also developed a cautious attitude towards the role of the expertise when it comes to assessing risks, along with a question of the ability of science to give definite answers.

This has lead in particular to the adoption of the Aarhus convention in 1998 and the evolution of several regulations in the developed countries. For example, in France the new law no. 2003–699 of 30 July 2003 about the ‘prevention of the technological and natural risks and to the compensation for the damages’ has introduced an important innovation into the process of technological risks prevention.

This law has enabled the involvement of the stakeholders in the decision-making process related to risk prevention and has urged the development of specific tools to deal with the complexity of risk management issues, in particular for those related to land-use planning.

As technical support to decision-makers in risk management from both public and private sectors, INERIS has played an important role for the evolution of the French risk management system.

This paper describes an analysis on the difficulty to control major accident hazards in an evolving context where the industrial systems becomes more and more complex and where the expectations of the civil society has increased. Then, the authors describe how an integrated vision for industrial risk management has emerged in France and is being implemented in a new law adopted after the Toulouse disaster.