External Environmental Costs Research Articles

Evaluation on the external environment cost of pig‐breeding with different size in sichuan province of China

In this article, pig manure treatment methods and technical levels in households were considered, and the market value method and the treatment cost approach were applied to estimate the external environmental cost (EEC) of pig‐farming with different scales quantitatively, reflecting the impacts of pig farming on the environment. Results show that the total EEC for medium‐scale farms is lower than that of range breeding and small‐scale farms. Its data envelopment analysis overall effective years are most, and its average scale efficiency and comprehensive efficiency are the highest, and its unit EEC is the minimal among the four scales. Therefore, range breeding should be narrowed, but the medium‐scale breeding should be moderately encouraged and developed. This is in line with Chinese policy and planning of developing livestock and poultry industry in moderate scale. © 2015 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Environ Prog, 34: 1488–1496, 2015

Life cycle cost analysis of wind power considering stochastic uncertainties

This paper presents a long-term cost analysis of wind power and compares its competitiveness to non-renewable generating technologies. The analysis considers several important attributes related to wind intermittency that are sometimes ignored in traditional generation planning or LCOE (levelized cost of energy) studies, including the need for more nameplate capacity due to intermittency, hourly fluctuations in wind outputs and cost for reserves. The competitiveness of wind power is assessed by evaluating four scenarios: 1) adding natural gas generating capacity to the power grid; 2) adding coal generating capacity to the power grid; 3) adding wind capacity to the power grid; and, 4) adding wind capacity and energy storage to the power grid where an energy storage device is used to cover wind intermittency. A case study in the state of Michigan is presented to demonstrate the use of the proposed methodology, in which a time horizon from 2010 to 2040 is considered. The results show that wind energy will still be more expensive than natural gas power plants in the next three decades, but will be cheaper than coal capacities if wind intermittency is mitigated. Furthermore, if the costs of carbon emissions and environmental externalities are considered, wind generation will be a competitive option for grid capacity expansion.

A novel reuse method for waste printed circuit boards as catalyst for wastewater bearing pyridine degradation

Abstract Reuse of waste printed circuit boards (WPCBs) has been a global issue from both the toxic and economic perspectives. Normal reuse methods such as pyrolysis or hydrometallurgy inevitably bring secondary environmental pollution and external cost. In this paper, a novel method using WPCBs as catalyst to degrade wastewater bearing pyridine was successfully testified. The results indicated that Fenton-like reaction was initialized by WPCBs. For 98.27 mg/L of initial pyridine concentration at natural solution pH of 7.12, 90% pyridine could be oxidized within 14 h with 4 g/L WPCBs and 146.72 mM H2O2 under 303.15 K. Moreover, the catalytic activity was slightly affected by the initial solution pH in a wide range of 4.0–10.0. During the reaction, both heterogeneous WPCBs and homogeneous leached ions from WPCBs contributed to the removal of pyridine. Cu(0), the main metal in WPCBs based on the XRD and ICP detection, played a dominant role during the reaction. According to the effects of scavengers (n-butanol, KI and p-benzoquinone), the surface-bounded hydroxyl radicals ( OH) and superoxide anions (O2−) had significant roles in the oxidation of pyridine. Glyceraldehyde and formamide were detected by GC–MS as the intermediates after reaction.

CHRISTIAN ECONOMISTS, ENVIRONMENTAL EXTERNALITIES AND ECOLOGICAL SCALE

The environmental economic response to mainstream neo-classical economics’ disconnect from the natural world was to value external environmental costs and include those into decisions about human welfare. The ecological economic response, heavily influenced by systems ecology, brought the concept of ecological scale or carrying capacity, as a limit to human choice. The divisions between these two theories are not merely cosmetic as illustrated by the highpolitical stakes in recent economic and environmental debates. This article concerns itself specifically with the question how Christian economists position themselves towards the unfolding ecological and economic crises. It is shown that the main positions taken in the policy debates on economy and ecology are closely mirrored in the broader Christian economic community, raising the question whether the Christian economic tradition does have anything particular to offer in response to the ecological and economic crises. We approach this question from two angles, first, reviewing the literature on an earlier debate by the Association of Christian Economists on what Christian economists should be doing and, second, reviewing the literature on the relationships between Christianity and environmental beliefs and behaviour. With reference to eco-theological literature on the varying theological views on the relationship between humanity and the rest of creation, and on different expectations of the eschaton, it is shown why such diverging positions are taken among Christian economists. Nevertheless, the objective reality of Jesus Christ demands a particular Christian ethics and behaviour, which in turn, kindles fertile questions for Christian economists in their practical engagement withthe economic and ecological sciences and with broader culture.

Forced internalization of external environmental cost: experience of a South African Company

While environmental regulations are designed to ensure that organizations comply with minimum environmental standards, organizations may be compelled to pay penalties if they exceed the set standard. This study provides explanations on the effectiveness of a forced internalization of external environmental cost in a brewery in South Africa. A review of relevant literature indicates the apathy of organizations to internalize environmental costs. To see whether this apathy still holds, this paper uses the contingency theory approach to management accounting to analyze a case study on the effectiveness of forced internalization of brewery wastewater treatment cost by a municipality in South Africa. Findings reveal that the policy forced brewery managers to develop a waste-reduction strategy to improve production efficiency while limiting the volume of brewery wastewater and chemical oxygen demand emissions discharged to municipal waste treatment plant. A significant implication of this study is the forced internalization of wastewater treatment cost and the use of resources more efficiently and sustainably in production by the brewery as a result of the municipality’s policy to demand extra fees when agreed minimum wastewater discharges are exceeded. The importance of this policy is that it brought about improvements to the environmental, social, and economic performances of the brewery. The study suggests that environmental regulators should look beyond mere regulatory and monitoring roles to formulate policies to ensure that organizations take responsibility for external environmental costs they have created.

Wind, coal, and the cost of environmental externalities

We compare the cost of generating electricity with coal and wind in Chile. On average, we estimate that the levelized cost of coal, including externalities, is $84/MWh. It is efficient to abate air pollutants (SOx, NOx and PM2.5) but not CO2. With abatement the cost wrought by environmental externalities equals $23/MWh or 27% of total cost. Depending on the price of coal, the levelized cost may vary between $72 and $99/MWh.The levelized cost of wind is $144/MWh with capacity factor of 24%. This cost includes backup capacity to maintain LOLP, which equals $13/MWh or 9% of total cost. The levelized cost of wind varies between $107/MWh with capacity factors of 35% to $217/MWh with capacity factors of 15%.Wind is competitive only with capacity factors around 35% and very high coal prices. Alternatively, a carbon price of $73/tCO2 ($268/tc) would make coal and wind equally costly. But this value implies a marginal damage at the 98th percentile of the distribution deduced from Tol's (2011) estimates, rather far from the mean, $16/tCO2 ($59/tc).

An Analysis of Developments and Challenges in Nutrient Management in China

During the past 50 years, China has successfully realized food self-sufficiency for its rapidly growing population. Currently, it feeds 22% of the global population with 9% of the global area of arable land. However, these achievements were made at high external resource use and environmental costs. The challenge facing China is to further increase food production while drastically decreasing the environmental costs of food production. Here we review the major developments in nutrient management in China over the last 50 years. We briefly analyze the current organizational structure of the "advisory system" in agriculture, the developments in nutrient management for crop production, and the developments in nutrient management in animal production. We then discuss the nutrient management challenges for the next decades, considering nutrient management in the whole chain of crop production-animal production-food processing-food consumption by households. We argue that more coherent national policies and institutional structures are required for research extension education to be able to address the immense challenges ahead. Key actions include nutrient management in the whole food chain concomitant with a shift in objectives from food security only to food security, resource use efficiency, and environmental sustainability; improved animal waste management based on coupled animal production and crop production systems; and much greater emphasis on technology transfer from science to practice through education, training, demonstration, and extension services.

Assessing future sustainability by forecast of Genuine Savings paths

The World Development Indicators (WDI) database provides historical trends of the Genuine Savings (GS) indicator, going back more than 40 years for about 200 countries. The indicator accounts for subsoil mineral depletion and global warming as environmental degradation. The major shortcoming of existing studies is that they have only considered present and past values of GS. This paper describes an approach to provide future paths of GS until the end of the current century by applying an integrated assessment model (IAM). To cover various mineral resources as well as their environmental impacts, we combine an originally developed mineral resource model and an existing detailed environmental impact assessment model with an existing, orthodox IAM. To be consistent with the WDI, we include data for subsoil resource depletion. Moreover, while applying the IAM, we consider a wider coverage of environmental impact categories compared to WDI. Our findings indicate that, after 2030, GS are positive, thus indicating sustainability in many geographical regions, except Latin America. The results also show that the critical factor that pushes down Gross Savings to GS is the environmental external cost from human appropriation of net primary productivity via land use and changes in land use.

Economic Damage Assessment of Coastal Development using Dynamic Bioeconomic Model

This article analyzes the interdependency between nonrenewable marine sand resources and renewable fishery resources by the developed dynamic bioeconomic model. The developed bioeconomic model is applied to a case study of efficient sustainable management for marine sand mining, which adversely affects a valuable blue crab fishery and its habitat in Korea. The socially-efficient extraction plan for marine sand and the time-variant environmental external costs to society in terms of diminished harvest rate of blue crab are determined. To take into account long-term effects from destroyed fishery habitat, a Beverton-Holt age structure model is integrated into the bioeconomic model. The illustrative results reveal that the efficient sand extraction plan is dynamically constrained by the stock size of the blue crab fishery over time. Thus, the dynamic environmental external cost is more realistic resource policy option than the classical fixed external cost for determining socially optimal extraction plans. Additionally, the economic value of bottom habitat, which supports the on- and off-site commercial blue crab fishery is estimated. The empirical results are interpreted with emphasis on guidelines for management policy for marine sand mining.

Evaluation of urban accessibility indicators based on internal and external environmental costs

This paper estimates urban accessibility considering types of transport and destinations, taking into account the internal travel time costs, and the ensuing external environmental impacts. Based on online and local surveys, an accessibility function is developed to allow for the construction of an accessibility curve for each transport mode that decreases with distance to represent decaying accessibility. An external environmental impact is associated with the accessibility indicators, taking into account the influence of the cold-start emissions that are particularly relevant for short-distance trips. The methodology is applied to neighborhoods in Lisbon, Portugal, with significant differences in their urban planning, mobility patterns, concentration of services and availability of public transportation.

An Approach for Calculating the Environmental External Costs of the Belgian Building Sector

SummaryThis article describes an approach developed to estimate the environmental external costs of the Belgian building sector. Several existing methods and related data sets for determining the monetary value of environmental impacts were reviewed and compared in light of their relevance to an impact assessment of the construction sector. This study concludes that the methods available consider different impacts and differ substantially in monetary values for identical impacts. A harmonized and transparent method is recommended to improve the feasibility and acceptance of internalizing external costs; agreement on the impacts to be assessed and their external costs based on current insights is important. Here, a new method is proposed for a life cycle impact assessment‐based valuation of environmental external costs for application to the Belgian building sector. To enable a comprehensive assessment, it became clear that solely considering “key” pollutants is insufficient.Although this article focuses on the development and not on the implementation of the method proposed, implementation revealed that the life cycle environmental external cost of new buildings (meeting current insulation standards or better) is relatively small compared to the life cycle financial cost.

Role of Brownfield Developments in Reducing Household Vehicle Travel

AbstractThe transportation sector is the second largest source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the United State. Developing underutilized urban industrial sites with certain characteristics (i.e., close proximity to transit, job and services, low remediation cost, and high density) can potentially reduce the transportation sector’s impact on the environment by lowering vehicle kilometers traveled (VKT) and related GHG emissions. This study examines the effect of residential brownfield developments on VKT reduction and the resulting costs (including the cost of driving time, fuel, and external air pollution costs) and further compares the resulting costs with the initial one-time cleanup cost of brownfield sites. Sixteen brownfield and conventional development sites were analyzed in Baltimore, Chicago, Minneapolis, and Pittsburgh. Travel demand models were used to estimate VKT differences among the developments. Air pollution valuation data were used to estimate external environmental cost differences...

A Weighted Average Incorporation of Pollution Costs into the Electrical Expansion Planning

In this paper we use the WASP-IV model to estimate the impact of internalizing several environmental external costs on the electricity sector's development plan. The major impact of internalizing the external cost is on fuel use. In the current electricity generation system, more natural gas and less coal have been used. A Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) of three scenarios has been performed focusing on taxing only one pollutant and looking at its overall implication. The benefit cost ratio was in the range of 4.32 – 5.57 while the net benefit was estimated to be in the range of 82–341 million USD annually. Greenhouse gases (GHG) contribute about 25% of these estimates hence; ancillary benefits are large enough to justify reducing those gases by between 7–12 percents compared to the baseline projection. We also carried a multi-objective analysis among the different scenarios. The weights were on the 3 pollutants (NOx, SO2 and PM) and CO2. Seven scenarios appear in the non-dominated set. Out of them, five appear in every year and hence policy makers ought to place higher weights on them. Out of those five, two are a single tax on one pollutant. Interestingly, most of the non-dominating strategies carry a 0 weight on CO2. This gives another justification to internalize externalities based on only local pollutants and so disregards the debate over the desirability of GHG reduction.

Research on Internalization of Environmental Costs of Economics

From the beginning of the industrial society, the problem of environmental pollution has been accompanied by economic development, there is a growing emphasis on the internalization of environmental costs to solve the problem of environmental pollution. Overall,the internalization of environmental costs helps to improve the level of welfare effect of the whole society, the internalization of environmental external costs is necessary. The measurement of environmental costs is the most important part of the internalization of environmental costs, and it is a prerequisite for internalization of environmental costs. In practice, we can use the general principles of measurement of environmental costs and general measurement model to correctly measure the environmental costs. Doing a reasonable estimate on the value of natural environmental resources of an industry helps to meet the objective requirements of social and economic benefit balance

Accounting for external environmental costs in a study of a Swedish district-heating system – an assessment of simplified approaches

External cost (XC) accounting of air pollution has been applied in a number of energy system studies in order to find least-cost solutions from a social-cost perspective. In these studies, the economic evaluation covers the XCs apart from the private costs. The greater number of life cycle processes, pollutants and environmental impacts covered, the more accurate the results will be but, obviously, the XC accounting process will be more complex and time-consuming. There is also the risk of increasing uncertainty as complexity increases, and the question is to decide on the appropriate level of comprehensiveness. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate certain simplified XC accounting approaches applied to a study of the district-heating (DH) system of Gothenburg, Sweden. The methodology applied is to vary the inclusion of pollutants and life cycle processes in the XC accounting under different scenarios. The results show that if environmental costs are estimated to be substantial and the net power generated in the DH system is assumed to replace generation in coal-fuelled power plants, limiting the coverage of life cycle processes and pollutants outside the DH system would not be appropriate. Instead, if assuming that power generation based on natural gas were replaced, the application of all simplified approaches studied leads to DH solutions that are congruent with those obtained employing a more comprehensive approach and is, thus, considered to be sufficient. However, results also show that certain simplified approaches are justified regardless of the assumed power generation replacement and given a wide range of environmental cost estimates used in the study, such as limiting the number of covered pollutants to the most relevant ones (CO2, SO2 and NOx). Thus, a less comprehensive XC accounting process may be considered appropriate for finding least social-cost solutions in the Gothenburg DH system, as well as potentially in many other DH systems featuring similar technical and environmental performance.

On process optimization considering LCA methodology

The goal of this work is to research the state-of-the-art in process optimization techniques and tools based on LCA, focused in the process engineering field. A collection of methods, approaches, applications, specific software packages, and insights regarding experiences and progress made in applying the LCA methodology coupled to optimization frameworks is provided, and general trends are identified. The "cradle-to-gate" concept to define the system boundaries is the most used approach in practice, instead of the "cradle-to-grave" approach. Normally, the relationship between inventory data and impact category indicators is linearly expressed by the characterization factors; then, synergic effects of the contaminants are neglected. Among the LCIA methods, the eco-indicator 99, which is based on the endpoint category and the panel method, is the most used in practice. A single environmental impact function, resulting from the aggregation of environmental impacts, is formulated as the environmental objective in most analyzed cases. SimaPro is the most used software for LCA applications in literature analyzed. The multi-objective optimization is the most used approach for dealing with this kind of problems, where the ε-constraint method for generating the Pareto set is the most applied technique. However, a renewed interest in formulating a single economic objective function in optimization frameworks can be observed, favored by the development of life cycle cost software and progress made in assessing costs of environmental externalities. Finally, a trend to deal with multi-period scenarios into integrated LCA-optimization frameworks can be distinguished providing more accurate results upon data availability.

Reducing the external environmental costs of pastoral farming in New Zealand: experiences from the Te Arawa lakes, Rotorua

Decades of nutrient pollution have caused water quality to decline in the nationally iconic Te Arawa (Rotorua) lakes in New Zealand. Pastoral agriculture is a major nutrient source, and therefore this degradation represents an external environmental cost to intensive farming. This cost is borne by the wider community, and a major publically funded remediation programme is now under way. This article describes the range of actions being taken to reduce nutrient loads from internal (lake bed sediments) and external (primarily diffuse) sources in the lake catchments. The high economic cost and uncertain efficacy of engineering-based actions to reduce internal nutrient loads is highlighted. Major changes to land management practices to control diffuse nutrient pollution are required throughout New Zealand if the need for costly and lengthy remediation programmes elsewhere is to be avoided. More action to educate farmers and the public about eutrophication issues, development and enforcement of environmental standards, and further consideration of the use of market-based instruments are proposed as ways to correct the current market failure.

Dispersion of pollutants, environmental externalities due to a pulverized coal power plant and their effect on the cost of electricity

Energy conversion systems generate pollution that causes damages to the environment and the society. The objective of this work is to study the dispersion of pollutants and assess the environmental and social cost due to pollution from such a system. For this purpose, a pulverized coal power plant is selected. Using thermodynamic principles combined with empirical techniques, the quantities of pollutants emitted by the plant are estimated. Then, using the EcoSenseWeb software, which is based on the results of the ExternE project, the external environmental cost (externalities) of pollution is assessed. The plant is considered as located in four different cities in Poland and the externalities are calculated for each city separately. It is shown that the external environmental cost has a strong influence on the unit cost of electricity. In addition, the dispersion of pollutants is presented for the plant located in Olsztyn city. Furthermore, the plant is considered as located near the capitals of European countries and the environmental externalities are calculated for each city. The neighboring countries that are strongly affected by the plant in each particular city are identified. The sensitivity of the unit cost of electricity to certain important parameters is investigated.

Pricing landfill externalities: Emissions and disamenity costs in Cape Town, South Africa

The external (environmental and social) costs of landfilling (e.g. emissions to air, soil and water; and ‘disamenities’ such as odours and pests) are difficult to quantify in monetary terms, and are therefore not generally reflected in waste disposal charges or taken into account in decision making regarding waste management options. This results in a bias against alternatives such as recycling, which may be more expensive than landfilling from a purely financial perspective, but preferable from an environmental and social perspective. There is therefore a need to quantify external costs in monetary terms, so that different disposal options can be compared on the basis of their overall costs to society (financial plus external costs). This study attempts to estimate the external costs of landfilling in the City of Cape Town for different scenarios, using the benefits transfer method (for emissions) and the hedonic pricing method (for disamenities). Both methods (in particular the process of transferring and adjusting estimates from one study site to another) are described in detail, allowing the procedures to be replicated elsewhere. The results show that external costs are currently R111 (in South African Rands, or approximately US$16) per tonne of waste, although these could decline under a scenario in which energy is recovered, or in which the existing urban landfills are replaced with a new regional landfill.

Incorporating environmental externalities into the capacity expansion planning: An Israeli case study

In this paper we use the WASP-IV model and develop methodology to estimate the impact of several environmental externality costs on the electricity sector development plan. For this purpose, 22 cases were generated which were later on reduced to only seven non-dominated cases by considering this problem as a dynamic multiple objective programming model. The major impact of internalizing the external cost is on fuel use. In the electricity generation system more natural gas and less coal has been used. A cost benefit analysis (CBA) of three scenarios has been performed focusing on taxing only one pollutant while looking at its overall implication. The benefit cost ratio was about 4.5 while the net benefit was about 200 million USD (depending on the scenario). Multi-objective analysis among the different scenarios was carried in a dynamic setting. Seven scenarios appear in the non-dominated set. Out of them five appears in every year and those should have a higher weight placed on them by policy makers. Out of those five, two are a single tax on one pollutant. Thus, policy makers might want to consider a mixture of taxes but for the sake of simplicity can also use a simple one tax on a given pollutant.