Environmental Economics (main)
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Environmental Economics
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Economic Cost of Weather in U.S.Economic Cost of Weather May Total $485 Billion in U.S. Routine weather events can add up to huge annual economic impact Everything has its price, even the weather. Research... More »
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Subsidies and market interventions Last Updated on 2015-03-05 20:24:45 Government interventions encompass a wide range of regulatory, fiscal, tax, indemnification, and legal actions that modify the rights and responsibilities of various parties in society. Interventions can increase or decrease costs to particular groups, effectively acting either as a subsidy or as a tax. Some of these policies increase societal welfare, while others subsidize powerful groups in society, sometimes making societal imbalances worse. This article provides a general overview of many types of subsidy policies, and describes how to calculate net subsidies to a particular sector. Subsidies represent government policies that benefit particular sectors of the economy. Government subsidies are common in most countries and benefit many industries. When these subsidies reduce the prices of natural resources or natural resource-intensive products, they... More » 
Economics of fisheries Last Updated on 2014-06-10 13:17:00 Fishing in open seas is a typical illustration of a situation where the tragedy of the commons is likely to occur. All the conditions described by Hardin are met in this case: an unrestricted number of users, unfettered by any limits on their access, extract an increasing share of a resource until natural resources are severely depleted, sometimes to the point of no return. Fishers tend to have little incentive to practice conservation, for they know that if they do not catch the available fish, someone else probably will. Without limits in place, fishers try to catch as many fish as they possibly can. Many traditional societies have evolved rules limiting the seasons or days when particular seafood species could be harvested (for example, prohibiting fishing at spawning season), or the amount that could be taken. In recent years these rules have in many cases been swept aside, in... More » 
Valuing the Ocean Last Updated on 2012-03-29 00:00:00 Valuing the Ocean is a study prepared by an international, multi-disciplinary team of experts coordinated by the Stockholm Environment Institute. The study will be published as a peer-reviewed book in 2012. A Summary has been released to inform preparations for the Rio+20 Earth Summit and is available. Valuing the Ocean The ocean is the cornerstone of our life-support system. It covers over 70 percent of our planet and generates the oxygen in every second breath we take; it has cushioned the blow of climate change by absorbing 25–30 percent of all anthropogenic carbon emissions and 80 percent of the heat added to the global system; it regulates our weather and provides food for billions of people. The ocean is priceless. The ocean has always been thought of as the epitome of unconquerable, inexhaustible vastness and variety, but this ‘plenty more fish in the... More » Economic Cost of Weather in U.S. Last Updated on 2011-06-23 00:00:00 Economic Cost of Weather May Total $485 Billion in U.S. Routine weather events can add up to huge annual economic impact Everything has its price, even the weather. Research indicates that such routine weather events as rain and cooler-than-average days can add up to an annual economic impact of as much as $485 billon in the United States. The study, led by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), found that finance, manufacturing, agriculture and every other sector of the economy is sensitive to changes in the weather. The impacts can be felt in every state. The results, published with co-authors from the University of Colorado at Boulder, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Stratus Consulting, appear in this month's issue of the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. The research was supported by the National Science Foundation... More » 
Solar power (Environmental Economics) Last Updated on 2010-04-25 00:00:00 Solar power is any process that generates electricity from the sun's radiation. There are two chief technologies for such electrical production: (a) photovoltaics (PV), where solar panels convert sunlight directly to electrical current; and (b) concentrating solar rays to boil water, which is used to provide power. In spite of the enthusiasm for solar plants in a few western countries, the technology requires significant subsidies to compete with fossil fuels, hydroelectric and nuclear power alternatives; in point of fact solar power supplied a mere .0002 of the world power supply as recently as 2008. Although solar is classified as a renewable energy source, there are some significant environmental impacts, including the generation of toxic cadmium residues and the significant destruction and fragmentation of natural habitats. Strides are being made in terms of... More » 
