Health Damage of Air Pollution: An Estimate of a Dose–Response Relationship for the Netherlands

This paper estimates the dose-response relationship between air pollution and the number of work loss days for the Netherlands. The study is based on illness data (work loss days) for the Dutch labour population and average year concentrations of air pollution in 29 districts. The dose-response relationship has been estimated by means of two different techniques: the ordinary least squares method (OLS) and the one-way fixed-effects method (OWFEM), which we consider to be more adequate. In general health effects are much smaller when OWFEM is applied than if OLS is used. With OWFEM a significant relationship is found between sulphate aerosol (SO₄), ammonia (NH₃) and the number of work loss days (WLDs). Particulates (TSP), O₃ and SO₂ have no significant effect on the number of WLDs. These results differ from those obtained in studies in the United States, which indicate that particulates (TSP) and other small particles, ozone (O₃) and to a lesser extent SO₄ and SO₂ significantly influence the number of WLDs.     

Natural resources, capital accumulation and the resource curse

Early concern by economists for the effect of natural capital on economic growth gave way to complacency and neglect during the nineteenth century. Evidence has emerged, however, that since the 1960s the economic performance of low-income countries has been inversely related to their natural resource wealth. This relationship is not a deterministic one so policy counts. SEEA can help improve the policy and performance of resource-abundant low-income countries by reinforcing the rationale for the sound management of natural resources and also by providing an index of policy sustainability in the form of the net saving rate. This policy index, along with other measures such as a capital fund for sterilizing the rent, initiatives to increase the transparency of rent flows and the rigorous evaluation of alternative uses of additional public sector revenue can improve the efficiency by which natural resource rent is transformed into alternative forms of capital to sustain rising social welfare. Chad and Mauritania provide case studies to illustrate how SEEA and net saving can be used to diagnose policy failure and improve economic performance.     

The Case of the Missing Pollution Haven Hypothesis

One particularly vexing puzzle for economists and policymakers over the past several decades concerns the empirical significance of the theoretically predicted pollution haven hypothesis. While neoclassical theory and conventional wisdom both surmise that local economies will suffer deleterious effects from stricter environmental regulations, empirical studies have largely failed to validate such claims. This study utilizes the method of matching to show that the impact of stricter regulation is heterogeneous spatially, varying systematically based on location-specific attributes. Previous studies that assume a homogenous response may therefore inadvertently mask the overall impact of more stringent regulations by pooling unaffected and affected regions.JEL Classification: Q25, Q28, H00, L51, R1The authors wish to thank to Michael Crew, Anthony Heyes, an anonymous referee, Werner Antweiler, Randy Becker, Wayne Gray, Shelby Gerking, Michael Greenstone, Vern Henderson, and Arik Levinson. Participants at various university seminars and conferences also lent useful insights to this line of research.     

Dynamic modelling of pollution abatement in a CGE framework

This paper deals with the specification of pollution abatement in dynamic computable general equilibrium (CGE) models and analyses the dynamic feedback mechanisms between economy and abatement in the context of environmental policy. A Ramsey-type economic model is presented, in which bottom-up technical and economic information on abatement techniques is integrated in a top-down dynamic CGE context. The practical suitability of the specification is illustrated by an empirical application for climate change and acidification in the Netherlands. The results show that a mixture of some slowdown of economic growth, a substantial restructuring of the economy and implementation of most technical abatement measures is optimal.     

油气企业环境会计的研究与探讨

在国民经济中占有主导地位的油气企业同时也是造成环境污染的主体之一,建立油气企业环境会计制度有着极其重要的现实意义。本文针对油气企业环境会计应用现状,运用环境会计基本理论,对企业环境会计核算方法及其信息披露模式进行了探讨,以期为油气企业环境会计实践提供理论依据和具体方法,推动油气企业环境会计建设的进程。     

森林与环境保护

森林在环境保护中的不可替代的作用与国家对林业政策支持之间尚有一定距离，需要国家采取扶持保护政策。     

论环境经济的市场机理

本文以现代产权经济理论为基础,以排污权交易为主要对象,论述了环境经济市场机理的形成基础、作用特点及交易边界等方面的问题。     

International Trade and the Environment: Theoretical and Policy Linkages

I review and extend three approaches to trade and environmental policies: competitive general equilibrium, oligopoly and monopolistic competition. The first two have surprisingly similar implications: deviations from first-best rules are justified only by constraints on policy choice (which motivates what I call a “single dividend” approach to environmental policy), and taxes and emissions standards differ in ways which reflect the Le Chatelier principle. I also show how environmental taxes may lead to a catastrophic relocation of industry in the presence of agglomeration effects, although not necessarily if there is a continuum of industries which differ in pollution intensity. *An earlier version was presented as an invited plenary lecture to the European Association for Environmental and Resource Economics Conference, Oslo, 1999.     

Transboundary Environmental Problems with Mobile but Heterogeneous Populations

Most of the literature on transboundaryenvironmental problems treats population ineach country or region as constant, ignoringpopulation mobility. We showed previously thatif there is perfect population mobility betweenregions, and populations are homogeneous, asocially efficient outcome can be supported asa Nash equilibrium of the game of uncoordinatedpolicy setting, even without any internationalenvironmental agreement. In the present paperwe introduce heterogeneous population, and showthat when people differ, a non-cooperativeoutcome is generally inefficient. We alsodemonstrate that for a particular set ofobjective functions for the regionalgovernments, there is an equilibrium of thegame of uncoordinated policy setting that isefficient. Finally, we give an example wherethe decentralized outcome is efficient whenthere is no population mobility, butinefficient when there is population mobility.     

Jointness in production and farmers' willingness to supply non-marketed ecosystem services

This paper highlights how farmers' willingness to supply non-marketed ecosystem services (ES) is influenced by whether or not the non-marketed ES are produced jointly with agricultural products. When marketed products and non-marketed ES share some production inputs the production relationships between the two may be complementary, competitive or substitutive. Using a cost minimization framework, it is shown how complementary relationships lead to costless voluntary provision of non-marketed ES (typically the case for ES that are supportive of provisioning ES for marketed farm products). It is also shown how competitive production relationships lead to provision of non-marketed ES at lower cost than when non-marketed ES are direct substitutes for farm products or are produced outside of agriculture. The paper closes by showing how the minimum willingness to accept (WTA) payment for ES that are complementary/competitive is less than or equal to the minimum WTA for the same ES produced in substitute or independent production relationships.