Search results for "Natural resource economics"

Investigating the role of environmental taxes and regulations for renewable energy consumption: evidence from developed economies

2021

The current study aims to explore the role of environmental taxes and regulations for the renewable energy consumption, focusing on reporting policy suggestions to overcome climate change issues and achieve environmental sustainability. The main objective of this paper is to examine the relation between renewable energy, environmental taxes, environmental technologies, and environmental regulations in 29 OECD countries during 1996–2018. More precisely, we inspect the impact of the environmental regulations and environmental technologies on the renewable energy consumption. The authors employ CIPS and CADF unit root tests, panel Westerlund co-integration test, FMOLS, and Quantile regression …

Spain: a decentralised health system in constant flux

2009

The Spanish healthcare system is one of Europe’s most efficient, but urgent reform is needed if it is to cope with changing demands and rising costs, argue Jose M Martin-Moreno and colleagues

The value of biodiversity.

1997

Foreste a tavola:i consumi alimentari inducono la crescente deforestazione tropicale e sub-tropicale anche in Italia

2021

L’agricoltura costituisce da sempre una grande minaccia per gli ecosistemi naturali del nostro pianeta,e non solo in quanto attività umana essenziale per la produzione di cibo. Attualmente, in particolarenella regione tropicale e sub-tropicale, le attività agricole sono fattori di pressione cruciali per il mantenimentodei cicli di vita di ecosistemi essenziali per la biosfera, complessi e resilienti, come le foreste. Lesocietà contemporanee, essenzialmente urbane e sempre più disconnesse dai processi naturali ed ecologici,tendono a dimenticare, o semplicemente non considerare, le responsabilità di queste pressioni insostenibili.Tra le maggiori cause di deforestazione, quattro commodities ri…

Levels of Welfare: The Role of Reservoirs

2012

Salinity gradient energy

2016

Abstract Beyond the most common renewable energy sources today exploited for the production of clean energy, salinity gradients power (SGP) has been attracting the increasing interest of scientists and companies involved in the field. This chapter provides an introduction to SGP, reporting a brief history of the technological developments throughout the years, from the beginning to present. A number of different SGP technologies have been developed in the last decades, all based on the concept of harvesting the energy from the controlled mixing of two solutions at different salinities. A theoretical analysis of the energy potential for SGP places this renewable source of energy among those …

The value of local climate and weather information: an economic valuation of the decentralised meteorological provision in Kenya

2020

The development of Sub-Saharan Africa will become increasingly constrained by the acute climate sensitivity of livelihood practices. Weather and climate services can improve climate risks to development by informing plans and decisions that ultimately reduce losses/maximize beneficial opportunities from climate variability and change. Yet, such services are typically highly aggregated, and notoriously difficult to communicate, especially to smallholder farmers and pastoralists where the need is greatest. Kenya Meteorological Department (KMD) are decentralizing service provision, and in so doing, offering disaggregated, contextualized, and more easily understandable localized weather and sea…

Long-term impacts of increased timber harvests on ecosystem services and biodiversity: A scenario study based on national forest inventory data

2020

Abstract The transition to a climate-neutral economy is expected to increase future timber demands and endanger the multifunctionality of forests. National scenario analyses are needed to determine long-term forest management impacts and support forest policy making in defining guidelines for the sustainable provision of forests’ ecosystem services and biodiversity (ESB). Using national forestry inventory data, the forest management model MASSIMO and a model to estimate harvesting costs, we simulated forest development in Switzerland under five politically relevant timber harvesting scenarios until 2106 (business as usual and four increased timber mobilisation scenarios). Model results were…

Irrigated Agriculture in Spain: Diagnosis and Prescriptions for Improved Governance

2012

The objective of this paper is to diagnose the current state of irrigation in Spain in order to support government decision makers to improve the design and application of their plans for action. The analysis implemented shows that this sector faces two main challenges: the decrease in the support given by the Common Agricultural Policy (lower subsidies/incomes) and the implementation of the European Water Framework Directive (stricter environmental requirements). While the survival of extensive irrigated agriculture in inland regions depends on farmers producing different crops and modernizing production techniques, littoral regions must respond with technological innovation, especially te…

Road project opportunity costs subject to a regional constraint on greenhouse gas emissions

2012

Abstract France has constrained the Aquitaine region to set up a climate plan to avoid an emission of 2883 ktCO 2 eq for the period 2007–2013. In parallel, the region has decided to carry out the construction of road infrastructures in order to avoid very high congestion costs. Those road projects will involve an increase in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions during that period. In the present context of strong sustainability, all emissions (direct and indirect) generated by those projects should be offset. At the regional level, the offsetting of GHG emissions is usually carried out by implementing carbon sequestration projects or projects that reduce energy demand. This paper aims at determin…