A Nationwide Analysis of U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Reservoir Performance in Meeting Operational Targets

The United States (U.S.) Army Corps of Engineers operates reservoirs across the U.S. with 89% of reservoirs constructed prior to 1980. Many reservoirs have experienced changes in environmental conditions (e.g., climate and sediment yield) and societal conditions (e.g., water/energy demand and ecological flows) since construction. These changes may challenge the potential for reservoirs to meet their operational targets (OTs) (management goals). Historic daily reservoir data and OTs were collected for 233 reservoirs. Analyses were developed to identify when and where reservoirs may be systematically departing from OTs in terms of the frequency and magnitude of departure. Fifty‐six percent of reservoirs consistently met operating targets, 30% were borderline, and 13% experienced frequent and large magnitude departures. Fifty‐two percent of reservoirs with large departures were due to shortages and were located in the South Pacific and Southwestern divisions. This work provides a framework to identify reservoir performance in relation to management goals, a necessary step for moving toward adaptive management under changing conditions. All individual reservoir analyses are provided via an interactive data visualization tool: https://nicholasinstitute.duke.edu/reservoir-data .     

Making the sustainable more sustainable: public transport and the collaborative spaces of policy translation

This paper investigates where and how sustainable transport goals are translated into public transport planning and operations. The case where this is explored is the Regional Public Transport Authority (RPTA) in Stockholm, Sweden. By drawing upon recent discussions on policy translation and political–administrative relationships, sustainable transport is found to be translated in two different collaborative spaces in the RTPA. In the market side of the authority, which is mainly preoccupied with procurement of traffic and compliance issues, sustainable transport is translated into quantitative goals (including biofuels, emissions, noise, etc.) and mechanically reproduced from the politicians via the civil servants to the private operators. In the planning side of the authority, sustainability measurements have been hard to quantify and the challenge to integrate land-use and transport planning is resolved in an organic manner, in specific projects, between the strategic transport planners in the RPTA and the land-use planners in the municipalities, at a distance from the politicians’ involvement. Throughout the RPTA, sustainable transport has broadened to also include social sustainability, although this has been difficult to translate into quantitative measurements, which is the desired mode of governance by the politicians.     

The use of regulatory taxation as a policy instrument for sustainability transitions: old wine in new bottles or unexplored potential?

The burgeoning literature on sustainable transitions links persistent environmental problems to the functioning of socio-technical systems. Conventional policy instruments, such as environmental taxation, are often rejected by transition scholars but in-depth studies on their potential are scarce. This paper explores the potential of the instrument of environmental taxation for influencing sustainability transitions. The multi-level perspective and the multi-phase perspective from transition thinking and the social practices approach are combined with the environmental economics theories of Pigou and Coase. Our analysis shows that the highest impact of regulatory taxation will be realised at the end of the take-off phase and in the acceleration phase of a transition. Although important barriers exist and many conditions apply, regulatory environmental taxation, especially as part of a smart policy mix, has more potential for contributing to sustainability transitions than hitherto assumed.     

Environmental management from left to right – on ideology,policy-specific beliefs and pro-environmental policy support

Due to growing environmental challenges, the demand for effective management through pro-environmental policy measures is increasing. The effectiveness is, however, largely determined by the degree to which the policy measures are supported by the actors affected by them. A consistent finding in the literature is that ideology (or subjective positioning on the left–right dimension) affects environmental policy support, with left-leaning individuals being more pro-environmental. A major caveat with previous research is that it seldom makes a distinction between different kinds of policies. Therefore, we are concerned with investigating how different ideological positions affect attitudes towards different forms of environmental protection. Using unique survey data, we show that ideology is related to conceptions about the fairness and effectiveness of different policy tools, which in turn steer preferences. In that sense, this paper makes the discussion on the effects of ideological position on pro-environmental policy support more nuanced.     

Current and future effectiveness of the Natura 2000 network for protecting plant species in Sardinia: a nice and complex strategy in its raw state?

Sardinia hosts 186 endemic plant species and represents an important centre for Mediterranean biodiversity. In view of the threats facing its flora, 27 terrestrial vascular plants have been listed in international regulations and 124 sites designated for species and habitat conservation. This study analyses gaps in the Natura 2000 network and the current and future distribution of four representative plants. Each plant population was georeferenced and the effectiveness of the Natura 2000 network was compared according to conservation status and distribution. Future species distributions were modelled by considering current climatic conditions and future scenarios. In apparent discordance with other results, we found that the Natura 2000 network represents most plant species well. This research shows a forward-looking survey on the regional effectiveness of protection measures which led us to confirm the need to enhance the current state of the Natura 2000 network by implementing local legislation and regulations.     

A roadmap for knowledge exchange and mobilization research in conservation and natural resource management

Scholars across all disciplines have long been interested in how knowledge moves within and beyond their community of peers. Rapid environmental changes and calls for sustainable management practices mean the best knowledge possible is needed to inform decisions, policies, and practices to protect biodiversity and sustainably manage vulnerable natural resources. Although the conservation literature on knowledge exchange (KE) and knowledge mobilization (KM) has grown in recent years, much of it is based on context‐specific case studies. This presents a challenge for learning cumulative lessons from KE and KM research and thus effectively using knowledge in conservation and natural resources management. Although continued research on the gap between knowledge and action is valuable, overarching conceptual frameworks are now needed to enable summaries and comparisons across diverse KE‐KM research. We propose a knowledge‐action framework that provides a conceptual roadmap for future research and practice in KE/KM with the aim of synthesizing lessons learned from contextual case studies and guiding the development and testing of hypotheses in this domain. Our knowledge‐action framework has 3 elements that occur at multiple levels and scales: knowledge production (e.g., academia and government), knowledge mediation (e.g., knowledge networks, actors, relational dimension, and contextual dimension), and knowledge‐based action (e.g., instrumental, symbolic, and conceptual). The framework integrates concepts from the sociology of science in particular, and serves as a guide to further comprehensive understanding of knowledge exchange and mobilization in conservation and sustainable natural resource management.     

Analysis of the relationship between environmental policies and air quality during major social events

Based on an analysis of major recent social events in China, such as the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, 2010 Shanghai World Expo, 2014 Nanjing Youth Olympic Games, and 2014 Beijing Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Conference, mandatory, temporary, and indemnificatory quantitative policies aimed at protecting air quality, which were carried out by both central and local governments, made substantial contributions to changes and improvements in air quality. To some extent, the findings show that command and control measures play a significant role in protecting air quality, while the law and economic and voluntary environmental safeguard measures do not during major social events. Therefore, it reminds us the air quality could and will improve not only during major social events but also in the regular days if we implement appropriate environmental policies and safeguard measures.     

Income inequality and willingness to pay for environmental public goods

We study how the distribution of income among members of society, and income inequality in particular, affects social willingness to pay (WTP) for environmental public goods. We find that social WTP for environmental goods decreases (increases) with income inequality if and only if environmental goods and manufactured goods are substitutes (complements). We derive adjustment factors for benefit transfer to control for differences in income distributions between a study site and a policy site. For illustration, we quantify how social WTP for environmental public goods depends on the respective income distributions for empirical case studies in Sweden and the World at large. We find that the adjustment for income inequality can be substantial.     

基于STIRPAT模型的中国城镇生活能源消费影响因素研究

为探究人口规模、收入水平、消费倾向、节能政策和技术等因素对中国城镇生活能源消费的影响,基于拓展的STIRPAT模型并运用2000~2013年中国省际面板数据对各影响因素的效应进行评估。结果显示:城镇生活能源强度、城镇居民消费倾向、人均可支配收入、城镇化率、总人口、政策综合力度6个因素的增长率每变化1%,将会引起城镇生活能源消费量增长率0.9322%、0.8537%、(0.559 2+0.169 2 ln DI)%、0.599 8%、0.408 0%、-0.012 0%的变化,表明除节能政策外,其余5因素均正向促进城镇生活能耗增长。其中生活能源强度对城镇生活能耗影响最大,节能政策虽会抑制城镇生活能耗增长,但作用较为微弱。政府需继续加强节能政策综合实施力度,从而实现生活能源消费领域的节能减排。     

Mercury: The good, the bad, and the export ban

We analyze the bipartisan call to ban US exports of commodity mercury. An export ban can generate positive environmental benefits by increasing the scarcity of mercury in developing economies where significant toxic releases occur. We show, however, that a direct mercury purchase and retirement policy can achieve the same foreign environmental goals without adverse impacts on domestic environmental quality. We present qualitative and quantitative evidence that highlight the potential inefficiencies of a mercury export ban as a method of achieving environmental objectives.