The Energy Policy Act of 2005 includes a provision designed to double the production and use of ethanol in fuels by 2012, and that beginning in 2013, a minimum of 250 million gallons per year of ethanol be produced from lignocellulosic sources such as corn stover, wheat straw, and switchgrass....

The electric power sector is a main source of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions that contribute to global warming. In the U.S., fossil fuel fired power plants are responsible for about 38% of the total CO2 emissions from all sources. Switching a significant portion of the U.S. electricity...

This paper focuses on empirically assessing determinants of river basin management decentralization, which is poorly understood while growing in popularity world wide. Measuring decentralization as a shift of decision making responsibility to water users or governments at the river basin level...

Many places, including the island of Oahu in Hawaii, have a number of groundwater aquifers. Consumers located in one aquifer area can be supplied from water extracted and transported from another aquifer if this results in cost savings over local extraction. Incorporating such interdistrict...

Because of the recent soaring petroleum price and growing environmental concerns, biodiesel has become an important alternative fuel. Biodiesel is the mono alky esters made from a vegetable oil, such as soybean or rapeseed oil, or sometimes from animal fats. The escalation in world petroleum...

The value of forests to poor communities within or around the forest has been garnering increasingly more attention. A recent study partially commissioned by the World Bank reveals that in some 54 case studies evaluated, forest income averaged 22% of total income. The income generated from...

The Opequon watershed is located in northern Virginia (VA) and the eastern panhandle of West Virginia (WV). In both states, Opequon Creek is classified as impaired based on violations of bacteria, benthic and biologic standards. Both VA and WV are using Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) plans to...

Paper replaced with revised version 06/03/08

One of the challenges in estimating economic impacts of recreational activity and natural resource use is collecting survey data when the underlying population is not perfectly known. We combine bootstrapping techniques with input output analysis to estimate impacts from recreational activity at...

We develop a simple game-theoretic model to explain the production decisions of firms when the production of a marketed good is complementary with the output of an associated good for which no market is available and the output of both goods is regulated by exogenously determined common pool...