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on Resource Economics |
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Issue of 2014‒02‒02
six papers chosen by |
| By: | Hottenrott, Hanna; Rexhäuser, Sascha |
| Abstract: | Significant policy effort is devoted to stimulate the development, adoption and diffusion of environmental-friendly technology. Sceptics worry about the effects of regulation-induced environmental technology on firms competitiveness. Since innovation is a crucial productivity driver, a potential crowding out of inventive efforts could increase the cost of mitigating environmental damage. Using propensity score matching, we study the short-term effects of regulation-induced environmental technology on non-green innovative activities for a sample of firms in Germany. We find indeed some evidence for a crowding out of the firms R&D and total innovation expenditures net of those costs due to the environmental innovation. The estimated treatment effect is larger for firms that are likely to face financing constraints. No significant effects are observed for the number of R&D projects and investments in non-innovation-related assets. Likewise, for firms with subsidy-backed environmental innovations no crowding out is found. -- |
| JEL: | O33 O31 Q55 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc13:79791&r=res |
| By: | Borck, Rainald; Pflüger, Michael |
| Abstract: | We study environmental pollution in an economic geography framework with two cities, where pollution arises from commuting within cities, goods transport between cities, production of manufacturing and agricultural goods, and residential energy use. We find that city size has an ambiguous effect on pollution levels. We also analyse how pollution changes with varying trade freeness, skilled wage income, and commuting costs. -- |
| JEL: | Q54 R12 F12 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc13:79763&r=res |
| By: | Schwerhoff, Gregor; Edenhofer, Ottmar |
| Abstract: | A major concern in climate negotiations is that decarbonization may signi cantly hurt the development process. This paper shows that international specialization can contribute to making environmental and economic objectives compatible. When carbon effi ciency di ffers between two trading partners, environmental policy a ffects production cost di fferentially, so that the comparative advantage in technology is endogenous. Under a global climate agreement, a universal carbon tax would shift the production of energy intensive goods towards carbon effi cient economies. Once emissions are correctly internalized, trade becomes unambiguously bene cial for the environment and allows pursuing both environmental objectives and fast economic growth. Even in the absence of a climate agreement, free trade provides the option of indirectly accessing carbon e fficient technology abroad. This improves the marginal rate of substitution between consumption and environmental quality and thus achieves emission reductions even without international cooperation. -- |
| JEL: | Q56 F18 H23 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc13:80036&r=res |
| By: | Massimiliano Mazzanti; Susanna Mancinelli; Marianna Gilli |
| Abstract: | Innovation is a key element behind the achievement of desired environmental and economic performances. Regarding CO2, mitigation strategies would require cuts in emissions of around 80-90% with respect to 1990 by 2050 in the EU. We investigate whether complementarity, namely integration, between the adoption of environmental innovation measures and other technological and organizational innovations is a factor that has supported reduction in CO2 emissions per value added, that is environmental productivity. We merge new EU innovation and WIOD data to assess the innovation effects on sector CO2 performances at a wide EU level. We find that jointly adopting different innovations is not a widespread factor behind increases in environmental productivity. Nevertheless, even though complementarity is not a low hanging fruit, a case where ‘innovation complementarity’ arises is for manufacturing sectors, that integrate eco innovations with product innovations. One example of this integrated action is a strategy that pursue energy efficiency with product value enhancement. We believe that the lack of integrated innovation adoption behind environmental productivity performance is a signal of the current weaknesses economies face in tackling climate change and green economy challenges. Incremental rather than more radical strategies have predominated so far. The latter have been confined to industrial ‘niches’, in terms of number of involved firms. This is probably insufficient when we look at long-term economic and environmental goals. |
| Keywords: | Complementarity; Innovation; Climate Change; Sector Performance |
| JEL: | L6 O3 Q55 |
| Date: | 2014–01–28 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:udf:wpaper:2014043&r=res |
| By: | Boeters, Stefan |
| Abstract: | Economic thought on climate policy as an instance of environmental regulation is strongly influenced by the principle of a uniform carbon price. Economists acknowledge that this principle breaks down in a second-best world with other distortions, such as taxes and market power in domestic and international markets. However, systematic analysis of this point in the economic climate policy literature is scarce. In the present paper, a computable general equilibrium (CGE) set-up is chosen in order to examine what pattern of differentiated carbon prices emerges as optimal in a second-best world. The CGE model WorldScan, which is considered to be representative of the class of models routinely used for numerical climate policy analysis, produces three main results: First, the optimal pattern of carbon prices is highly differentiated, ranging from almost prohibitive taxes to high subsidies (with a range of more than 1700 euros per ton of CO2). Second, the welfare gain from switching from a uniform price to optimally differentiated prices is enormous, equivalent to a 27% emission reduction for free. Third, the most important drivers of carbon price differentiation are market power in export markets as well as taxes on consumption, intermediate inputs and domestic output. This shows that carbon price differentiation cannot be dismissed as a policy option lightly. However, before translating these findings into concrete policy advice, the relevant features of modelling pre-existing distortions in CGE models need close revision. -- |
| JEL: | Q54 H21 D58 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc13:79738&r=res |
| By: | Jans, Jenny (Uppsala Center for Labor Studies); Johansson, Per (Uppsala Center for Labor Studies); Nilsson, J Peter (Uppsala Center for Labor Studies) |
| Abstract: | On normal days, the temperature decreases with altitude, allowing air pollutants to rise and disperse. During inversion episodes, a warmer air layer at higher altitude traps pollu- tants close to the ground. We show how readily available NASA satellite data on vertical temperature proles can be used to measure inversion episodes on a global scale with high spatial and temporal resolution. Then, we link inversion episode data to ground level pollution monitors and to daily in- and outpatient records for the universe of children in Sweden during a six-year period to provide instrumental variable estimates of the eects of air quality on children's health. The IV estimates show that the respiratory illness health care visit rate increases by 8 percent for each 10 m=m3 increase in PM10; an es- timate four times higher than conventional estimates. Importantly, by linking the health care data to detailed records of parental background characteristics, we show that chil- dren from low-income households suer signicantly more from air pollution than children from high income households. Finally, we provide evidence on the importance of several mechanisms that could contribute to the dierence in the impact of air pollution across children in rich and poor households. |
| Keywords: | Air pollution; Health; inversions; environmental policy; instrumental variable; nonparametric regression; socio-economic gradient in health |
| JEL: | I12 I14 J24 Q53 |
| Date: | 2014–01–20 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:uulswp:2014_001&r=res |