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Ecologists and economists have promoted the concept of ecosystem services as a means of assisting environmental decision-making. Currently, several U.S. federal agencies and international institutions are incorporating the ecosystem services approach into their decision-making processes. Since 1999, the concept has been included in guidance documents for environmental impact assessments under the U.S. National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). More recently, the U.S. Forest Service approved a Planning Rule to include ecosystem services in Forest Plans. However, some people already describe the U.S. Forest Service NEPA process as cumbersome, which might be compounded by adding new layers of analysis. To assess the potential of incorporating ecosystem services into land management decisions, we surveyed over 500 U.S. Forest Service professionals about incorporating ecosystem services in environmental impact analysis processes. Our goal was to determine (a) whether and how the ecosystem services concept is currently used in Forest Service NEPA analyses, (b) staff perceptions about how influential NEPA guidance documents are, and (c) whether respondents think that the ecosystem services concept is useful in NEPA processes (and more broadly in environmental decision-making). Forty-one percent of respondents were unfamiliar with ecosystem services, but a majority of the respondents thought that ecosystem services could be helpful in the NEPA process. Opinions were divided about whether or not ecosystem services would improve communication with stakeholders. One finding with potentially broad implications for executive branch policy-making is that survey results indicate that U.S. Forest Service staff found Environmental Protection Agency and Council on Environmental Quality guidance documents less influential than internal Forest Service directives. At the same time, the guidance documents that include ecosystem services language were the least influential among the guidance documents listed in the survey. Applying the results as a case study to advance ecosystem services scholarship, we suggest clarification of the ecosystem services framework, metrics, and guidance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cross Compliance (CC) is a mechanism for encouraging farmers to fulfill certain environmental conditions in return for governmental support payments. Introduced to United States (US) and European Union (EU) agricultural policy from the 80s onwards, upcoming new US (Farm Bill 2012) and EU (Common Agricultural Policy after 2013) policies will include CC. Cross Compliance is seen (i) as a policy for enforcing environmental objectives or (ii) as a way to organize and reward agricultural public good production. In recent years, the instrument's effectiveness and efficiency have been criticized. To validate the deviating understandings, we drew back on an economic institutionalist perspective. We found that regarding EU CC as payment for public goods does not generally align with the existing German property rights distribution. In both the EU and US, CC standards above those contained regulatory law have characteristics of a payment for public goods but create severe problems. We conclude that CC, even if useful for triggering and broadening environmental protection efforts, may cause several long-term problems. Therefore, the rights structure should be clearly communicated, law enforcement function should be temporary, the instrument should be included in an overall concept, and payments should be better linked to the environmental output. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A semi-empirical endogenous growth theory was proposed by the authors in 2005. It is based on a model of the economy as a two-stage materials/energy processing system. Growth is simulated by a two-parameter production function with two traditional factors, labor and capital, and a non-traditional factor, namely ‘useful work’. The non-traditional factor is calculated from primary energy inputs multiplied by an empirically estimated average energy conversion efficiency, which is a function of changing technology over time. This model ‘explains’ past US growth from 1900 through 1973–74 with satisfactory accuracy but it slightly underestimates subsequent growth (i.e. it leaves a small unexplained but increasing residual) for the period after 1975. However, by subdividing capital stock into traditional and ICT components, we are able to extend the theory to explain US economic growth accurately. In this paper we also extend the results to Japan. The revised production function has only three independent parameters. The new model also has implications for future economic growth, energy and environmental policy that differ significantly from the traditional growth theory. These implications are discussed briefly. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper examines the impact of environmental regulation on the productivity of manufacturing plants in the United States. Establishment-level data from three Censuses of Manufactures are used to estimate 3-factor Cobb–Douglas production functions that include a measure of the stringency of environmental regulation faced by manufacturing plants. In contrast to previous studies, this paper examines effects on plants in all manufacturing industries, not just those in “dirty” industries. Further, this paper employs spatial–temporal variation in environmental compliance costs to identify effects, using a time-varying county-level index that is based on multiple years of establishment-level data from the Pollution Abatement Costs and Expenditures survey and the Annual Survey of Manufactures. Results suggest that, for the average manufacturing plant, there is no statistically significant effect on productivity of being in a county with higher environmental compliance costs. For the average plant, the main effect of environmental regulation may not be in the spatial and temporal dimensions. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Using the Environmental Scorecard ratings of Congressmen and Senators published annually by the League of Conservation Voters, we explore empirically whether political support for pro-environment legislation, aggregated across each legislative body, is sensitive over time to changing economic conditions — that is, whether there is a political trade-off between economic conditions and the environment. Using LCV scorecard ratings from 1970 to 2008, we find evidence, consistent across both the House and Senate, that political support for the environment is related to per capita income, but this general tendency can be decomposed into sharp differences by party. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

There is substantial concern that bioenergy policies could swamp other considerations, such as environmental values, and lead to large-scale conversions of land from forest to crops. This study examines how bioenergy and marketed environmental rents for forestland potentially influence land use in the Midwestern US. We hypothesize that current land uses reflect market values for environmental benefits of forestland, so that the marketed component of the environmental value of land can be captured as the difference between Census land values and value of land as a timber asset. We use a multinomial logit model to estimate the land use shares of forests, crops and urban in Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. The results show that marketed environmental rents increase forestland relative to cropland. To examine the effects of biofuels on land use, we conduct policy analysis by altering future land rents. Our baseline scenario projects that urban development uses mostly cropland, but with higher crop rents resulting from increased demand for bioenergy, there will be significant losses of forestland to urban and cropland. On the other hand, if marketed environmental rents grow while crop rents are maintained at their baseline value, urban growth will occur, primarily at the expense of cropland. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

A survey was designed to elicit donations for delaying inevitable aquatic invasions of inland water bodies within a respondent's region. Surveys were distributed throughout the United States. Assuming all aquatic species groups invade simultaneously, our results suggest that the average person was willing to make a one-time payment of $48 to delay low to high impacts one year (aggregates to nearly $4billion for all U.S. households). By comparison, the federal government currently (2006) invests $394million annually for all invasive species (aquatic and terrestrial) prevention and early detection/rapid response. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The US Clean Air Act Amendments introduce an emissions trading system to regulate SO2 emissions. This study finds that changes in SO2 emissions prices are related to innovations induced by these amendments. We find that electricity-generating plants are able to increase electricity output and reduce emissions of SO2 and NO x from 1995 to 2007 due to the introduction of the allowance trading system. However, compared to the approximate 8% per year of exogenous technological progress, the induced effect is relatively small, and the contribution of the induced effect to overall technological progress is about 1–2%. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The discussion about what reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are required and how the emissions rights might be distributed globally has fostered the belief that there is a fundamental conflict between the rich nations of the “North” and the poor but populous nations of the “South.” The argument is that grandfathering the rights will only reinforce existing global inequalities, while per capita distribution of the rights would lead to such huge transfers of wealth to the South as to be unacceptable to the North. However, a very simple general equilibrium model highlighting key elements of the global economy shows that this perception is incorrect under a plausible interpretation of the goal of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to “avoid dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.” Instead of using an economic damage function to determine the optimal level of emissions reductions, the model''s utility functions are calibrated to reflect scientific understanding of what would be required to stabilize the atmosphere at safe concentrations of greenhouse gases. Among policy options that would accomplish this, the United States has a preference for grandfathering the allocation of emissions rights over a per capita allocation, but this preference is not strong and could be offset by other geopolitical considerations. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Agri-environmental policies (AEPs) in the United States and the European Union are examples of payments for environmental services that pay farmers to reduce the negative externalities of agricultural production, while serving as a means to transfer public funds to farmers. We show that despite similar origins, AEPs in the two regions differ both in their specific objectives and in their implementation. For example, AEPs in most member states of the EU-15 have the additional objective of using agriculture as a driver for rural development. This objective is achieved by compensating farmers for the private delivery of positive public goods, such as attractive landscapes, produced by agriculture. The rationale is market failure, and there is empirical evidence that Europeans are willing to pay for such positive externalities. No comparable provision exists in U.S. policy. By contrast, U.S. AEPs focus almost entirely on reducing agriculture''s negative externalities, such as soil erosion. Second, we find that U.S. programs are more targeted than their EU counterparts, and take opportunity cost into account. The EU programs, on the other hand, address a wider range of externalities, and are focused more on the paying for a particular farming process than reducing specific negative externalities. The EU takes a broader view of AEPs than does the United States, both in terms of type of activity that can be funded, and by using less targeting by land characteristics, and so the European program could be more easily used as a mechanism for transferring income to producers. Despite this, we find evidence that many of the amenities targeted by the programs are demanded by the population. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The global decline in trade barriers means that environmental regulations now potentially play an increasingly important role in shaping a country''s comparative advantage. This raises the possibility that pollution intensive industries will relocate from high regulation countries to developing regions where environmental regulations may be less stringent. We assess the evidence for this possibility by examining the USA''s revealed comparative advantage (RCA) and other measures of specialization. We demonstrate that US specialization in pollution intensive sectors is neither lower, nor falling more rapidly (or rising more slowly) than in any other manufacturing sector. We offer an explanation for this finding. Our analysis suggests that pollution intensive industries have certain characteristics – specifically they are intensive in the use of physical and human capital – that makes developing countries less attractive as a target for relocation. We demonstrate econometrically the economic and statistical significance of these factors and illustrate how they appear to oppose the effects of environmental regulations as determinants of US specialization. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In light of concerns that structural changes to US production may not be accompanied by similar changes to US consumption, this paper provides a detailed examination of US environmental load displacement over the period 1974–2001. The forces that drive such displacement are also examined, with particular attention paid to the scale and composition of US consumption, the share of imports in consumption, the role of environmental regulations and the potential impact of NAFTA. It is found that the USA as a whole has experienced environmental load displacement over the period under consideration, with the extent of this displacement seeming to increase over the last decade. It would appear to be the increasing scale of US trade that is increasing environmental load displacement. Indeed, the composition of US imports and exports have become significantly cleaner over the period considered. However, although imports from Mexico have grown more rapidly than exports to Mexico, no evidence is found to suggest that NAFTA is increasing displacement to Mexico. With regard to US domestic consumption patterns, although they have become cleaner, a greater share than ever is now met via imports. Sectoral pollution abatement costs are found to be a determinant of this increasing share of imports in domestic consumption. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]