Disarming the population bomb

This paper argues for a renewed international focus on managed population reduction as a key enabler of sustainable development. The paper presents development data that demonstrate why population reduction should be elevated to share top priority with poverty alleviation, as the two over-arching goals of international development strategy. The critical analysis put forth in this paper argues that the current ‘unsustainable’ approach to sustainable development stems from (1) ‘empty world’ economic growth theory applied to a ‘full world’, which is (2) supported and driven by socioeconomic incentives to expand population, (3) justified through flawed interpretation of demographic transition theory, (4) bolstered by the exaggerated efficacy of environmental economic theory applied in a resource-constrained world, (5) insulated from challenge by limitations of scientific knowledge and (6) perpetuated by herd behavior. This paper concludes that failure to reduce global population will inhibit attainment of poverty alleviation and worsen environmental degradation.     

Biofuels and agriculture: a past perspective and uncertain future

The US corn ethanol industry has grown from virtually nothing in the early 1980s to over 14 billion gallons in 2011. Subsidies have been an important impetus for the industry, and they have existed in one form or another throughout the life of the industry. This paper provides (1) a brief look at the history of the linkages between energy and agriculture and how they have changed with biofuels; (2) a review of some of the major impacts of the US corn ethanol program; and (3) analysis of prospective impacts of cellulosic biofuels. There is no doubt that biofuels have brought about a new era for global agriculture. Historically, the prices of agricultural and energy products moved in response to supply and demand factors relevant to each market, but moved largely independent of one another. Corn ethanol has changed that, and today there is a link between crude oil and corn that is driven by the demand side. Since agricultural commodity prices are linked both on the demand and supply sides, the corn–crude oil link spills over to other agricultural commodities as well. Development of cellulosic biofuels has been much slower than hoped. The feedstocks are more expensive than initially believed. Conversion technologies remain uncertain and expensive. There are many uncertainties through the cellulosic supply chain, and government policy remains uncertain as well. Thus, the future of the cellulosic biofuels industry is, at this point, an open question.     

Announcing climate policy: Can a green paradox arise without scarcity?

Unintended consequences of a pre-announced climate policy are studied within a framework that allows for competition between polluting and clean energy sources. We show that early announcement of a carbon tax gives rise to a “green-paradox,” in that it increases emissions in the interim period (between announcement and actual implementation), irrespective of the scarcity of fossil fuels. The paradoxical outcome is driven by consumption-saving tradeoffs facing households who seek to smooth consumption over time and holds both when the announced implementation date is taken as a credible threat and when households are skeptical about the (political) will or capability of the government to implement the policy as announced.     

Can decentralized planning really achieve first-best in the presence of environmental spillovers?

It is generally accepted that decentralized policy choice in the presence of interjurisdictional spillovers is inefficient. Strikingly, Ogawa and Wildasin (2009) find that in a model with heterogenous jurisdictions, interjurisdictional capital flows, and interjurisdictional environmental damage spillovers, decentralized planning outcomes are equivalent to that under a centralized planner. We first show the critical importance of two key assumptions (no retirement of capital, fixed environmental damages per unit of capital) in obtaining this result. Second, we consider a more general model allowing for capital retirement and abatement activities and show that the outcome of a decentralized market generally differs from the solution of a centralized planner?s social welfare-maximizing problem.     

Carbon leakage: Grandfathering as an incentive device to avert firm relocation

Emission allowances are sometimes distributed for free in an early phase of a cap-and-trade scheme to reduce adverse effects on the profitability of firms. This paper investigates whether grandfathering can also be used to avert the relocation of firms to countries with lower carbon prices. We show that under certain conditions, relocation can be averted in the long run, even if the grandfathering scheme is phased out over time and immediate relocation is profitable in its absence. This requires that the permit price triggers sufficient investments into low-carbon technologies or abatement capital that create a lock-in effect which makes relocation unprofitable.     

The optimal time path of clean energy R&D policy when patents have finite lifetime

We study the optimal time path for clean energy innovation policy. In a model with emission reduction through clean energy deployment, and with R&D increasing the overall productivity of clean energy, we describe optimal R&D policies jointly with emission pricing policies. We find that while emission prices can be set at the Pigouvian level independently of innovation policy, the optimal level of R&D subsidies and patent lifetime change with the stages of the climate problem. In the early stages of clean energy development, innovators find it more difficult to capture the social value of their innovations. Thus, for a given finite patent lifetime, optimal clean energy R&D subsidies are initially high, but then fall over time. Alternatively, if research subsidies are kept constant, the optimal patent lifetime should initially be long and fall over time.     

Valuing floodplain protection and avoidance in a coastal watershed

Flood‐related losses in the United States are increasing despite large‐scale mitigation efforts. To offset the rising cost of floods, the US Congress passed legislation in 2014 that will augment insurance premiums to make the National Flood Insurance Program more actuarially sound. Consequently, there is interest in lowering flood‐related costs to the homeowner, both in terms of premiums and damage. This study addresses the issue by integrating premium savings and damages avoided based on several mitigation scenarios. Specifically, it examines how much policyholders within a watershed near Houston, Texas, could have saved between 1999 and 2009 had their communities introduced specific avoidance‐based mitigation activities. The results indicate that homeowners and communities can offset premium rises and a majority of the damage suffered through marginal expansions of such initiatives. However, the costs associated with their implementation could counter some of these savings, and hence they need to be considered in future work.     

The social cost of carbon revisited

An estimate of the social cost of carbon (SCC) is crucial to climate policy. But how should we estimate the SCC? A common approach uses an integrated assessment model (IAM) to simulate time paths for the atmospheric CO₂ concentration, its impact on temperature, and resulting reductions in GDP. I have argued that IAMs have deficiencies that make them poorly suited for this job, but what is the alternative? I present an approach to estimating an average SCC, which I argue can be a useful guide for policy. I rely on a survey of experts to elicit opinions regarding (1) probabilities of alternative economic outcomes of climate change, but not the causes of those outcomes; and (2) the reduction in emissions required to avert an extreme outcome, i.e., a large climate-induced reduction in GDP. The average SCC is the ratio of the present value of lost GDP from an extreme outcome to the total emission reduction needed to avert that outcome. I discuss the survey instrument, explain how experts were identified, and present results. I obtain SCC estimates of $200/mt or higher, but the variation across experts is large. Trimming outliers and focusing on experts who expressed a high degree of confidence in their answers yields lower SCCs, $80 to $100/mt, but still well above the IAM-based estimates used by the U.S. government.     

江苏省农村环境监测现状及“十四五”工作建议

农村生态环境保护是实现乡村振兴不可缺少的一环,是保障农业农村高质量发展的基础。基于"十三五"江苏省农村环境监测体系和2020年全省农村环境质量监测结果,分析了全省农村环境监测现状。指出,江苏省农村环境监测工作存在监测任务较重、基础信息获取难度较大、水环境监测代表性不足、监测指标单一以及对农业面源污染治理成效评估支撑不够等问题;提出,强化部门数据共享与信息整合、完善农村环境例行监测网络、构建农业面源污染监测技术体系、探索特色指标监测研究、加强农村环境监测人才队伍建设等"十四五"江苏省农村环境监测工作建议,以期摸清农业面源污染现状,为全省农村生态环境治理提供技术支撑。     

碳中和目标下的北京城市道路移动源CO2和大气污染物协同减排效应研究

为实现2060年碳中和目标,研究北京城市道路移动源CO_2和大气污染物(CO、NO_x、PM_(2.5))的协同减排效应。本文以2016年为基准年,建立CO_2和大气污染物排放量的LEAP模型,设计三种政策情景,预测到2060年各类污染物排放量,并通过减排效应坐标系分析和减排弹性系数法研究不同措施下CO_2和大气污染物的协同减排效应。结果显示,综合政策情景的减排作用最好,且协同减排效应最显著,但在2060年无法实现碳中和目标;单一措施情景下,严格排放标准措施的协同减排效果有限,但对各污染物的减排协同性最优,推广公共交通减排协同性次之,发展新能源车辆措施具有较好的协同减排效果,但对CO_2—CO和CO_2—PM_(2.5)的减排协同度较差。对此,本文提出应加快推动交通能源结构转型,在新能源车取代燃油类机动车的同时,要不断减少天然气类车型的比例,尽可能实现"电能+新能源汽车"的零排放能源结构;还要加严机动车排放标准限值以加强CO_2和大气污染物的减排协同度;制定相应的机动车CO_2和大气污染物协同排放限值标准目标,构建CO_2与大气污染物排放协同管理体系等建议。