双层委托——代理关系下环境管理的激励机制设计

在环境管理中,公众、环境管理者和排污企业3个主体形成了双层委托—代理关系,导致合谋寻租的现象发生,进而造成环境管理的低效率。通过建立环境管理中合谋寻租的博弈模型,找到影响各主体收益的因素,得出提高对政府部门和企业排污的惩罚系数、降低公众监督环境管理部门的成本、提高其监督的成功率可以降低环境管理者与企业合谋寻租概率的结论,并提出在具体实践中要公开环境信息、畅通公众监督渠道和加强对政府监管失职的惩罚力度。     

环境影响评价中公众参与有效性的研究

对中国环境影响评价中公众参与的现状和存在的问题进行了调研分析,筛选出影响公众参与有效性的指标,并采用层次分析法建立了公众参与有效性的评价指标体系。选取上海市近几年完成的50余本环境影响报告书作为抽样样本,对上海市环评报告中公众参与的有效性进行了评估,最后结合存在的问题提出了提高有效性的对策措施。     

嗜盐菌相溶物质合成与转运调节机制

嗜盐菌是极端环境微生物的重要类群之一,作为新型微生物资源,为微生物生理、遗传分类及生命科学和相关学科许多领域的研究提供新的课题.文章综述了嗜盐菌的嗜盐渗透压分子调节机理中,相溶物质胞外吸收转运与胞内生物合成途径涉及的结构基因、主要酶类的相关研究进展,并对后续研究进行讨论与展望.     

基于RS与GIS技术的龙井市生态环境评价

良好的生态环境是人类赖以生存和发展的基础,而社会和经济的发展必须要以保持生态环境的稳定和平衡为前提。本文利用RS和GIS技术,采用科学化量化指标,对龙井市生态环境进行评价,得到2000和2007年吉林省龙井市生态环境综合指数图,并进行动态分析。结果表明：2000-2007年龙井市生态综合指数整体呈现增加的趋势,2000年龙井市生态综合指数平均值为35.94,而到2007年龙井市生态综合指数平均值增加到38.45。7年间,良等级地面积增加最多,增加26.26个百分点,中、差、劣等地面积都在减少。2000年和2007年龙井市东部地区生态环境要好于西部地区。这表明政府政策的实施、人民环保意识提高等起到重要的作用。     

水质标准中指示微生物的发展及现状

饮用水病原微生物污染是公共卫生面临的主要威胁之一,微生物监测在水质监测中的必要性日益受到人们的认可。在实际工作中,一般是通过检测指示微生物间接反映病原微生物的存在。通过调研国内外各组织、机构颁布的水质标准发现,近年来,我国环境质量标准和污染物排放标准中对于指示微生物的选择有从总大肠菌群向粪大肠菌群和大肠埃希氏菌(E.coli)转变的趋势,而美国环保署、欧盟、世界卫生组织、澳大利亚国家健康与医疗研究委员会等根据最新的流行病学证据,强调了大肠埃希氏菌(E.coli)、肠球菌(Enterococci)与粪便污染的相关性更强,可用于替代大肠菌群。建议我国在后续水质标准中对微生物指标进行增补修订时,参考国外经验,形成集成多种指示微生物与多种特定病原体的监测指标体系,以更好地保护环境功能和民众健康。     

eChemPortal及其在我国重点环境管理危险化学品环境风险评估中的应用

危害性识别是化学品环境风险评估工作的重要基础,危害性数据的质量直接影响化学品环境风险评估工作的结果与结论。通过介绍经济合作与发展组织(OECD)eChemPortal近几年来的主要变化,以上海地区涉及的30种重点环境管理危险化学品为例,比较分析我国《危险化学品分类信息表》及eChemPortal引用的按照《欧盟物质和混合物的分类、标签和包装法规》的公开分类和标签目录(ECHA CL inventory)、日本政府全球化学品统一分类和标签分类结果(GHS-J)的差异。结果表明:eChemPortal作为OECD建立的全球化学物质信息门户,加入的数据库多数经过政府机构或同行评审,准确性和可靠性相对较高,目前已有32个数据库加入到该平台,其中32个数据库支持化学物质检索,4个数据库支持化学性质检索,2个数据库支持GHS检索,并且数据库的数量和功能还在持续增加;相对于国家安全监管总局的《危险化学品分类信息表》和ECHA CL inventory,GHS-J的危害性分类结果较为完善,而且多数分类结果提供了具体的分类数据基础信息,这对于分类结果的评估十分有用。上述研究表明我国政府监管部门有必要结合eChemPortal等权威的数据信息平台发布我国重点环境管理危险化学品环境风险评估推荐数据库,从而规范重点环境管理危险化学品环境风险评估过程并推动对化学品的有效环境监管。     

Price-based vs. quantity-based environmental regulation under Knightian uncertainty: an info-gap robust satisficing perspective

Conventional wisdom among environmental economists is that the relative slopes of the marginal social benefit and marginal social cost functions determine whether a price-based or quantity-based environmental regulation leads to higher expected social welfare. We revisit the choice between price-based vs. quantity-based environmental regulation under Knightian uncertainty; that is, when uncertainty cannot be modeled with known moments of probability distributions. Under these circumstances, the policy objective cannot be to maximize the expected net benefits of emissions control. Instead, we evaluate an emissions tax and an aggregate abatement standard in terms of maximizing the range of uncertainty under which the welfare loss from error in the estimates of the marginal benefits and costs of emissions control can be limited. The main result of our work is that the same criterion involving the relative slopes of the marginal benefit and cost functions determines whether price-based or quantity-based control is more robust to unstructured uncertainty. Hence, not only does the relative slopes criterion lead to the policy that maximizes the expected net benefits of control under structured uncertainty, it also leads to the policy that maximizes robustness to unstructured uncertainty.     

Iron Ore Industry Emissions as a Potential Ecological Risk Factor for Tropical Coastal Vegetation

In the coastal zone of the Espírito Santo state, Brazil, fragments of restinga, which form a natural ecosystem, share their space with an increasing number of iron ore industries. The iron ore dust and SO(2) originating from the industry processing activities can interfere with the vegetation of the adjacent ecosystems at various levels. This study was undertaken in order to evaluate the effects of industry emissions on representative members of the restinga flora, by measuring physiological and phenological parameters. Foliar samples of Ipomoea pes caprae, Canavalia rosea, Sophora tomentosa, and Schinus terebinthifolius were collected at three increasing distances from an ore industry (1.0, 5.0, and 15.0 km), and were assessed for their dust deposition, chlorophyll, and Fe content. Phenological monitoring was focused on the formation of shoots, flowers, and fruits and was also performed throughout the course of a year. The results showed that the edaphic characteristics and the mineral constitutions of the plants were affected by industry emissions. In addition, the chlorophyll content of the four species increased with proximity to the industry. Phenological data revealed that the reproductive effort, as measured by fruit production, was affected by emissions and S. tomentosa was the most affected species. The use of an integrative approach that combines biochemical and ecological data indicates that the restinga flora is under stress due to industry emissions, which on a long-term basis may put the ecosystem at risk.     

Consolidation in an Individual Transferable Quota Regime: Lessons from New Zealand, 1986–1999

Market-based approaches to environmental regulation (such as tradable permits or transferable quotas) are frequently offered as innovative solutions to many environmental problems. Globally, one of the most well-established forms of this approach is individual transferable quotas (or ITQs) in fisheries management. Within the natural resource management community, there is considerable debate over the effects ITQs have on the fishing industry and fisher behavior although this approach is not well-established in the United States. The previously imposed moratorium on ITQs in the United States has expired and the 2006 reauthorization of the Magnuson-Stevens Act explicitly provides for limited access privileges (LAPs). A variety of fishers, regulators, and conservation organizations are enthusiastically seeking to introduce ITQ management. With debate over whether and how ITQs should be used in American fisheries reinvigorated, it is timely to examine the evidence on the social and economic effects of ITQs in other nations’ fisheries. After briefly summarizing the debate on ITQs, we examine the case of New Zealand, one of the earliest and longest-lived ITQ-based fisheries regimes. We use multiple data sources and methods to analyze the extent to which industry consolidation and aggregation has occurred, including surveys of industry participants, expert interviews, reviews of academic reports and analyses, analysis of trade publications, and direct analysis of quota ownership patterns. This analysis shows a more complex outcome than recent debates in the ITQ literature would predict. These findings suggest that policy makers considering ITQs can learn from the experiences of other countries related to key issues such as quota allocation, aggregation limits, transferability, cost recovery, and resource sustainability when designing ITQ and other LAP systems. It is also important to explicitly identify economic and social objectives and then carefully design ITQ regimes to meet these objectives.     

The Decision Analysis Interview Approach in the Collaborative Management of a Large Regulated Water Course

There are always conflicting goals in the management of large water courses. However, by involving stakeholders actively in the planning and decision-making processes, it is possible to work together toward commonly acceptable solutions. In this article, we describe how we applied interactive multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA) in a collaborative process which aimed at an ecologically, socially, and economically sustainable water course regulation policy. The stakeholders' opinions about the alternative regulation schemes and the relative importance of their impacts were elicited with the HIPRE software. Altogether, 20 personal interactive decision analysis interviews (DAIs) were carried out with the stakeholders. Our experience suggests that the DAIs can considerably improve the quality and efficiency of the collaborative planning process. By improving communication and understanding of the decision situation in the steering group, the approach helped to develop a consensus solution in a case having strong conflicts of interest. In order to gain the full benefits of the MCDA approach, interactive preference elicitation is vital. It is also essential to integrate the approach tightly into the planning and decision-making process. The project's home pages are available to the public at http://www.paijanne.hut.fi/.