Contingent behavior and odor nuisances. The case of "Le Cortine" selection and composting plant in the Province of Siena

Recent regulation on waste fees establishes the change from tax to tariff to cover the total management cost of the collection and selection services. It does not consider the external costs (externalities). This causes a distortion in the system of relative prices. In this paper, we focus on one particular type of externality: the odour due to the waste treatment and we estimate the damage produced by a selection and composting centre. In the literature, we can find different hedonic price and contingent valuation studies that aim to estimate individual willingness to pay (WTP) to improve air quality reducing contaminants with (direct or indirect) effects on human health. However, few studies focus on reversible externalities, such as odour. This study intends to enrich the literature on this area. To the authors’ knowledge, it is the first attempt to estimate the WTP to reduce odour emissions due to a selection and composting centre. Considering the peculiarity of the case study, we produce our estimates with the relatively new method of Contingent Behaviour.