Mixed signals: market incentives, recycling, and the price spike of 1995

Environmental economics assumes that reliance on price signals, adjusted for externalities, normally leads to efficient solutions to environmental problems. We explore a limiting case, when market volatility created ‘mixed signals’: prices of waste paper and other recycled materials were suddenly extremely high in 1994–1995, then plummeted back to traditional low levels in 1996. These rapid reversals resulted in substantial economic and political costs. A review of academic and business literature suggests six possible explanations for abrupt price spikes. An econometric analysis of the prices of wood pulp and waste paper shows that factor which explained price changes in 1983–1993 contribute very little to understanding the subsequent price spike. From the econometric analysis and from other sources, we conclude that speculation must have played a major role in the price spike, perhaps in combination with modest effects from changes in government policy and in export demand. If speculatively driven price spikes can disrupt an environmentally important industry such as recycling, what is the appropriate role for public policy? When price volatility is sufficiently disruptive, then measures to control or stabilize prices, rather than interfering with the market, might help to make it more efficient.     

WATER EXCHANGES: TOOLS TO BEAT EL NIÑO CLIMATE VARIABILITY IN IRRIGATED AGRICULTURE1

ABSTRACT: Using a case study of the Yakima River Valley in Washington State, this paper shows that relatively simple tools can be used to forecast the impact of the El Niño phenomenon on water supplies to irrigated agriculture, that this information could be used to estimate the significantly shifted probability distribution of water shortages in irrigated agriculture during El Niño episodes, and that these shifted probabilities can be used to estimate the value of exchanges of water between crops to relieve some of the adverse consequences of such shortages under western water law. Further, recently devised water‐trading tools, while not completely free under western water law to respond to forecasted El Niño episodes (ocean circulation patterns), are currently being employed during declared drought to reduce the devastating effects of water shortages in junior water districts on high valued perennial crops. Additional institutional flexibility is needed to take full advantage of climate forecasting, but even current tools clearly could prove useful in controlling the effects of climate variability in irrigated agriculture. Analysis shows the significant benefit of temporarily transferring or renting water rights from low‐value to high‐value crops, based on El Niño forecasts.     

不同挺水植物在生活污水中生长量及去污能力比较研究

以千屈菜、香根草、芦苇、香蒲、美人蕉、水葱、风车草7种常见挺水植物为对象,研究了在生活污水中进行培养的植物生长量和氮磷积累量差异以及改善水质指标的能力差异。结果表明:芦苇和美人蕉的生长量显著高于其他植物,美人蕉的氮磷积累量最高,美人蕉和芦苇对污水的综合处理效果最好。     

Consumer Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Indicative, Legitimation, and Regulatory Role in Agricultural and Food Ethics

Disputes over agriculture and foodproduction have occurred against a background ofdisputed authority with regard to governments,experts, and single issue pressure groups. Consumershave intervened in quite significant ways with manyaltering their buying patterns. The conventionalassessment of consumer ``preferences' throughaggregated purchases fails to reflect the ethicalnature of significant numbers of purchase decisions.Nevertheless, consumers seem to offer a wider basis onwhich to consider ethical issues. The author proposesthat a valuable inclusion of consumer opinion in thedebates would require a move away from neo-classicaleconomics and the selective inclusion of consumeropinion to unravel the complexity of (aggregated)consumer behavior. It is argued that Hirschman'sframework of ``exit, voice, and loyalty' is a moreappropriate tool for the understanding of ethics infood consumption.     

基于资源-技术-环境的高技术城市矿产战略性筛选

城市矿产中蕴含大量的高技术矿产,它们是战略性新兴产业发展的关键原材料。本文从中国国情出发,界定了涵盖新能源技术、通讯设备、交通工具、电池、电器电子产品等5大类共计27种高技术城市矿产,从资源、技术、环境三个维度设计了11项指标,对高技术城市矿产进行战略性筛选;并通过半定量化不确定性分析方法确定研究结果的可靠性。结果显示:(1)从资源-技术两维度看,电器电子产品用电池资源指数高,且技术相对成熟;动力汽车电池资源指数值略低,但未来开发潜力大。(2)从资源-环境两维度看,电池是拆解处置重点。(3)从资源-技术-环境三维度来看,高技术城市矿产可以分为四个梯队:高资源指数、高技术指数、高环境指数的"三高"梯队,包括EEE用镍氢电池、EEE用镍镉电池、EEE用锂离子电池;中高资源指数、中高技术指数、中高环境指数的"三中高"梯队,包括手机和动力汽车电池;低资源指数、低技术指数、中高环境指数的"二低一中高"梯队,包括风涡轮机、荧光灯、动力汽车永磁电机和电话机;资源指数、技术指数、环境指数都相对较低的"三低"梯队,包括电器电子产品和光伏电板。此外,随着时间的推移,筛选结果会发生动态变化,因此高技术城市矿产的战略性筛选是一个持续动态的评估过程,需要建立与之相适应的"开发一批、储备一批、谋划一批"的动态管理系统。基于研究结论,本文从高技术城市矿产的基础数据库建立、重点开发目录制定与调整、在线回收与交易平台构建、拆解技术储备以及可持续供应体系建立等方面提出了建议。     

Co-creating an alternative: the moral economy of participating in farmers’ markets

Growing dissatisfaction with the globalised food system, articulated on the behalf of both producers and consumers, has caused a variety of public debates surrounding the ethics of food production and consumption to become increasingly visible in society over the last two decades. Simultaneously, farmers’ markets (FMs) and other forms of direct marketing have experienced a noteworthy increase in participants, indicating an emerging demand for an alternative to conventional food networks, alternatives that are often perceived as providing a more just and moral relationship to food production and consumption. This study examines consumer and producer motivations for participation in FMs and opinions towards conventional and alternative agriculture in order to elucidate what (if any) values and morals are shared among producers and consumers. This study draws upon the theoretical framework of moral economy to understand whether these shared values suggest FM participants are working to co-create an alternative economy based on “moral” principles such as fairness, justice, and reciprocity. This mixed-methods study consists of consumer surveys (N?=?377) and semi-structured interviews with producers (N?=?17) from five FMs in the state of Delaware. The results suggest that producer and consumer motivations to participate in FMs, particularly a shared emphasis on social value, are indicative of a sense of moral economy. However, this moral economy is complicated by tension towards consumers and the alternative food movement more generally expressed on behalf of producers.     

Benefit‐Cost Analysis of Integrated Water Resource Management: Accounting for Interdependence in the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan

Integrated water resource management (IWRM) requires accounting for many interrelated facets of water systems, water uses and stakeholders, and water management activities. The consequence is that project analysis must account for the nonseparability among the component parts of IWRM plans. This article presents a benefit‐cost (B‐C) analysis of a set of projects included in the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan proposed for the Yakima Basin in south‐central Washington State. The analysis accounts for interdependence among proposed water storage projects and between water storage and water market development in the context of historical and more adverse projected future climate scenarios. Focusing on irrigation benefits from storage, we show that the value of a given proposed storage project is lower when other proposed storage projects in the basin are implemented, and when water markets are functioning effectively. We find that none of the water storage projects satisfy a B‐C criterion, and that assuring proposed instream flow augmentation is less expensive by purchasing senior diversion rights than relying on new storage to provide it.     

Incommensurability and property rights in the natural environment

Cost–benefit analysis has been criticised on the grounds that it cannot compute the value of environmental goods whose value constitutively defies monetary valuation. Two forms of incommensurability make monetary valuation problematic: constitutive incommensurability and quantitative incommensurability. These pose a threat only to shadow pricing, and not the formation of prices in an actual market. Where property rights to environmental goods are appropriately assigned, the prices that form reflect the actual uses persons put them to, given their value commitments. In a real market, the formation of prices does not depend upon the assignment of cardinal values via monetary valuation; rather, the formation of prices is a side effect of the way in which environmental goods are used. A property right gives one the right to reject terms of exchange one deems inappropriate. Where sale of an environmental good is deemed inappropriate, it is kept out of the cash nexus. Incommensurability therefore precludes cost–benefit analysis, but not markets in environmental goods where property rights are appropriately allocated.     

垃圾渗滤液中微塑料分析的消解方法评价

微塑料(MPs)是近年来国内外关注度极高的新兴污染物,建立实际环境样品中MPs的分析方法是开展相关研究的基础.对于复杂污水样品而言,样品的消解过程至关重要,将极大地影响MPs的准确分析.选择垃圾渗滤液为典型复杂污水样品,采用样品浊度和色度变化、残余悬浮固体量、MPs在颗粒物中的占比为评价指标,对盐酸消解、30％过氧化氢...     

新型污染物及其生态和环境健康效应

近年来,随着现代分析手段的改进和发展,各种污染物检测能力的提高,以及新的毒作用模式的发现、新合成化合物的制造和使用等,一些物质成为广受国内外关注的新型污染物.新型污染物已在世界范围内对环境和生态系统造成了污染,对生态系统中包括人类在内的各种生物均构成了潜在的危害.目前,人们关注较多的新型污染物主要有全氟有机化合物、人用与兽用药物、饮用水消毒副产物、遮光剂/滤紫外线剂、人造纳米材料、汽油添加剂、溴化阻燃剂等.论文在总结国内外相关研究基础上,对一些重点新型污染物的生态效应及其潜在健康影响进行了简要综述,为我国开展这方面的研究提供了一定的参考.