Environmental Economics (220:332) Web Resources

• General information
• Background on topics and articles covered in class
• The local environment/NJ public policies
  

General environmental economics information:

• Association of Environmental and Resource Economists.  Information about the field of environmental economics. Especially useful: a listing of graduate programs in environmental economics.
  
• EPA's National Center for Environmental Economics. Information on economic analysis of environmental policy, including a database of cost benefit analyses.
  
• Resources for the Future.  A Washington, DC think tank specializing in environmental economics.  They sometimes have research assistant positions for college students and recent graduates.
  
• Environmental economics blog.  Bits from the media and some research as well
  
• EPA's P3 Awards: A National Student Design Competition for Sustainability Focusing on People, Prosperity, and the Planet.  Got any good ideas?

 Background on topics/articles covered in class:

• Solid Waste:
• Basic facts about solid waste from EPA.
  
• Pay as you throw information from EPA
• Effect of disposal charge on households (must be on campus or authenticated to access). Paper by Fullerton and Kinnaman
• Tradeable permit programs:
• SO2 Allowance Trading:
• EPA's websites for its Clean Air Markets (SO2 and NOx)  
• An evaluation of the SO2 program  – A recent overview of the program by Dallas Burtraw and Karen Palmer of Resources for the Future.
• Carbon trading
• Article from Bloomberg on the business of carbon credits  (recommended by an alumnus of Econ 332 who now works for Bloomberg)
• Evaluating benefits of environmental policies
• Contingent Valuation (CV) study of Exxon Valdez spill  -- Journal article by Carson et al
• Value of life years -- NYT article by  Krueger
• Air pollution and U.S. Clean Air Act:
• Information on global air pollution trends. From the World Resources Insitute
• Criteria Air Pollutants  Information on their harms, sources, and trends.
• Climate Change:
• Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change  A UN Agency that tries to summarize consensus on the science and social science of climate change.  Received the Nobel Peace Prize (along with Gore).  Some of the in-class presentation is from here.
• climateprediction.net Help resolve scientific uncertainty!  This British project runs climate simulations on your computer when your CPU is not in use (along the lines of SETI).  You'll get information on the simulation your computer has performed and on climate modeling more generally.
• Kyoto Protocol: Text and details 
• Some economists views on the way forward:  (you will need to be on campus or authenticated through RU Libraries to access these):
• "Life after Kyoto"  by Nordhaus  (some of graphs shown in class from here)

The local environment and NJ policy:

• Air pollution in New Jersey. 
• The Raritan Watershed.  Pollution and water withdrawals.
• Value of New Jersey's Parks  Environmental economics from the NJ Department of Environmental Protection.  Applies some of the valuation techniques we discussed in class.

• NJ's climate change program
• Predictions about effects of climate change in the Northeast
• Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.  Northeast states greenhouse gas cap-and-trade. Initiative's web site