Competitive versus efficient extraction of a common property resource: The groundwater case
Abstract In this paper socially optimal and private extraction of a common property aquifer are compared. Open-loop equilibrium and feedback equilibrium in linear strategies have been computed to characterize private extraction. The use of these two equilibrium concepts allows us to distinguish between cost and strategic externalities as long as the open-loop solution captures only the cost externality, and the feedback solution captures both. The results show that strategic behaviour increases the overexploitation of the aquifer compared to the open-loop solution. However, if the groundwater storage capacity is large, the difference between the socially optimal and private extraction, the …
Self-enforcing international environmental agreements with a stock pollutant
In this paper the stability of an International Environmental Agreement (IEA) among N identical countries that emit a pollutant are studied using a two-stage game. In the first stage each country decides noncooperatively whether or not to join an IEA, and in the second stage signatories jointly against nonsignatories determine their emissions in a dynamic setting defined in continuous time. For this second stage we have studied both the open-loop Nash equilibrium and the feedback Nash equilibrium. A numerical simulation shows that a bilateral coalition is the unique self-enforcing IEA independently of the gains coming from cooperation and the kind of strategies played by the agents (open-lo…
Strategic Behavior and Efficiency in the Common Property Extraction of Groundwater
Groundwater has always been regarded as a common property resource where entry is restricted by land ownership and private exploitation is inefficient. In 1980, Gisser and Sanchez presented a first estimation of this inefficiency, cornparing socially optimal exploitation with private (competitive) exploitation using a model with linear water demand, average extraction cost independent of the rate of extraction and linearly decreasing with respect to the water table level. They characterized the private exploitation of the aquifer assuming that farmers are myopic and choose their rate of extraction to maximize their current profits, whereas optimal exploitation is obtained by maximizing the …
A note on cooperative versus non-cooperative strategies in international pollution control
Abstract In this note, we evaluate the scope of Dockner and Long’s [Journal of Environment Economics and Management 24 (1993) 13] conclusion on the efficiency of the non-cooperative outcome in a differential game of international pollution control. We also complete the study of the different equilibria the differential game can present. Our results show that their conclusion requires that the initial value of the stock of pollution be higher than the Pareto-efficient pollution stock so that the equilibrium path of emissions involves a decreasing stock of pollution. Our results also show that the application of the procedure proposed by Tsutsui and Mino [Journal of Economic Theory 52 (1990) …
J curve for abatement with transboundary pollution
In this note an alternative framework to Selden and Song's (1995) work is proposed in order to clarify some of their results and verify whether the relationship between pollution abatement and national income can be drawn as a J curve when there is more than one country involved. As Selden and Song do, pollution is considered as a flow externality. Their model is extended to a two country case which requires the use of differential games. The optimisation problem is decomposed into two stages, the pollution abatement and the accumulation problem. A J curve for pollution abatement is replicated and a static comparative analysis confirms that the smaller the rate of discount and/or the less p…