Journal Article

Permanent link for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10535/5

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Assessment of Biomass Burning in the Conterminous United States
(1998) Leenhouts, Bill
"Wildland fire has been an integral part of the landscape of the conterminous United States for millennia. Analysis of contemporary and pre-industrial (~ 200 - 500 yr BP) conditions, using potential natural vegetation, satellite imagery, and ecological fire regime information, shows that wildland fires burned 35 - 86 x 106 ha (megahectares) annually in the pre-industrial era, consuming 530 - 1230 teragram (Tg) of biomass. At present, in comparison, 5 - 7 Mha/yr burn, consuming 77 - 189 Tg of biomass annually. If historic fire regimes were restored to non-urban and non-agricultural lands today, 18 - 43 Mha would burn annually, consuming 285 - 602 Tg of biomass. For each era, 11 biomass (wildland and agricultural) burning emissions were estimated, and differences of similar magnitude were found. Estimates of contemporary fossil fuel emissions are also provided for comparison. Atmospheric, climatic, social, and ecological system effects from the decrease in area burned, biomass consumed, and emissions produced are discussed."
Clearing the Air: Four Propositions about Property Rights and Environmental Protection
(1999) Cole, Daniel H.
"Privatization is sweeping the globe. Since the Reagan-Thatcher revolution of the 1980s, governments around the world have been selling off public assets to private owners in order to improve efficiency and increase production. Between 1985 and 1994, $468 billion worth of state enterprises were sold off to private investors. But privatization so far has been limited to state enterprises. Governments have not, with a few notable and highly controversial exceptions, gun selling off their vast natural resource holdings, including forest lands, parks, and waterways. This is a mistake, according to some economists who claim that the same economic arguments favoring private ownership of economic producers (polluters and resource users) also support private ownership of natural resources (i.e., environmental goods). As Richard Stroup and Sandra Goodman put it, government ownership and control works just as badly with environmental resources as with all other resources. In their view, privately owned natural resources would be better managed not only economically but environmentally. But critics argue that the claims of these so-called free market environmentalists are unrealistic, based on faulty premises, overly reliant on anecdotal evidence, and oblivious to economies of scale and the transaction costs of resource privatization."
An Evaluation of Integrated Climate Protection Policies for the United States
(1998) Bernow, Stephen; Duckworth, Max
"This paper presents and discusses an integrated set of policies designed to reduce U.S. carbon emissions over the next four decades. This innovation path also aims to promote environmental quality, particularly by reducing emissions of criteria air pollutants, to reduce U.S. dependence on imported oil, and to induce technological innovation and diffusion in energy production and consumption. The innovation path would reduce economy-wide carbon emissions by 26% below baseline projections for 2010 and by 62% below baseline projections for 2030; this translates into 10% below 1990 levels in 2010 and 45% below 1990 levels in 2030. Emissions of criteria pollutants also would be significantly reduced, as would petroleum imports by the United States. Moreover, the innovation path would yield cumulative net savings for the United States of $218 billion (1993 dollars) through 2010, or $19 billion on a leveled annual basis, and would result in 800,000 additional jobs nationwide by 2010. Although the overall findings from the innovation path analysis are robust, the results should be taken as indicative, rather than precisely predictive, owing to uncertainties in future costs, prices, technology performance, and consumer behavior."
Governing the Invisible Commons: Ozone Regulation and the Montreal Protocol
(2014) Epstein, Graham; Pérez, Irene; Schoon, Michael; Meek, Chanda L.
"The Montreal Protocol is generally credited as a successful example of international cooperation in response to a global environmental problem. As a result, the production and consumption of ozone-depleting substances has declined rapidly, and it is expected that atmospheric ozone concentrations will return to their normal ranges toward the end of this century. This paper applies the social-ecological system framework and common-pool resource theory to explore the congruence between successful resolution of small-scale appropriation problems and ozone regulation, a large-scale pollution problem. The results of our analysis correspond closely to past studies of the Protocol that highlight the importance of attributes such as a limited number of major industrial producers, advances in scientific knowledge, and the availability of technological substitutes. However, in contrast to previous theoretical accounts that focus on one or a few variables, our analysis suggests that its success may have been the result of interactions between a wider range of SES attributes, many of which are associated with successful small-scale environmental governance. Although carefully noting the limitations of drawing conclusions from the analysis of a single case, our analysis reveals the potential for fruitful interplay between common-pool resource theory and large-scale pollution problems."
Pollution Trading and Environmental Injustice: Los Angeles' Failed Experiment in Air Quality Policy
(1999) Drury, Richard Toshiyuki; Belliveau, Michael E.; Kuhn, J. Scott; Bansal, Shipra
"Pollution trading has been touted as a great innovation in environmental policy making and a key tool for sustainable development. Pollution trading allows a polluter to forego reductions in pollution (or increase pollution) at its own facility in exchange for reducing emissions elsewhere or by purchasing credits which represent someone elses pollution reduction. Pollution trading advocates argue that this approach saves money, promotes innovative technology, and continuously reduces pollution through market incentives. In contrast, they claim that technology-based regulations, commonly referred to as command and control, are economically inefficient and rigidly over-prescriptive."
Urban Growth and Air Quality in Kuala Lumpur City, Malaysia
(2010) Ling, O.H.L.; Ting, K.H.; Shaharuddin, A.; Kadaruddin, A.; Yaakob, M.J.
"Urban developments, land use patterns and activities not only influence the volume of emissions into the ambient air environment but also affect the ability of the urban ecosystem to purify the air. Therefore, urbanisation affects the quality of air in urban areas. However, urban air quality is also affected by global, regional or trans-boundary pollutants. The objectives of this paper are to understand the trend of air quality level and urban growth in Kuala Lumpur city (KL), and examine the relationship between these variables. Results of analysis show a significant and strong relationship between the number of unhealthy/hazardous days and urban land uses. The finding is contrary to the argument that the high concentration of air pollutants (unhealthy level) in the Malaysian city is contributed by the forest fire in a neighbouring country (haze)."

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