All advanced industrialized societies face the problem of air pollution produced by motor vehicles. In spite of striking improvements in internal combustion engine technology, air pollution in most urban areas is still measured at levels determined to be harmful to human health. Throughout the...

To avoid high profit levels often experienced in countries where monopolies in public utility sectors are regulated through price-cap mechanisms, several regulatory agencies have recently introduced profit-sharing (PS) clauses aimed at obtaining price reductions to the benefit of consumers....

The joint evolution of participating and complying firms in a public VA, along with the evolution of the pollution stock is examined. Replicator dynamics modeling participation and compliance are combined with pollution stock dynamics. Fast-slow selection dynamics are used to capture the fact...

In 2003, an industry-financed, government-administered buyback of trawl fishing permits and vessels took place on the US West Coast, resulting in the retirement of about one-third of the limited-entry trawl fleet. The lack of cost data in this fishery precludes an analysis of how the buyback has...

Short-term auctions for access to entry terminals of the British gas-network appear to successfully allocate scarce resources and capture scarcity rent. Now long-term auctions are being introduced to guide future capacity expansion decisions. In our model the fraction of rights issued in the...

The determinants of incentive regulation are a key issue in industrial policy. I study an asymmetric information model of incentive rules selection by a political principal endowed with an information-gathering technology whose efficiency increases with the effort exerted by two accountable...

We use conjoint choice questions to investigate people’s preferences for income and reductions in mortality risks delivered by contaminated site remediation policies. Our survey is self-administered using the computer by residents of four cities in Italy with severely contaminated sites. We...

This paper provides an overview of the Italian water management system, with particular reference to the links between agriculture and water resources, and emphasis on underground resources. Our objective is mainly descriptive at this level; nonetheless, we try to evaluate patterns of...

Cleaning up contaminated sites is one of the most important environmental policy priorities in many countries. Remediation of contaminated sites is attractive because it reduces risks to human health and ecological systems, and brings a host of potential social and economic benefits. Even when...

State Voluntary Cleanup Programs (VCPs) were established starting in the 1990s to encourage the environmental remediation and redevelopment of contaminated properties. These programs typically offer liability relief, subsidies and other regulatory incentives in exchange for site cleanup. This...