We examine policy instruments for ambient water quality protection. One objective is to illustrate the unique and complex informational challenges that must be addressed in constructing instruments that are effective and efficient for point and nonpoint sources. A second objective is to describe...

We consider the design of ambient taxes forrisk-neutral and risk-averse polluters whenpolluters and the regulatory agency haveasymmetric information about environmentalrelationships and probabilities associatedwith random events. Unlike prior work, we showthat under these conditions, optimal...

Research on nonpoint pollution control instruments has focused primarily on incentives applied either to production inputs that affect nonpoint pollution, or to ambient pollution concentrations. Both approaches may in theory yield an efficient solution. However, input-based incentives will...

Recent EU law of safety self-regulation by firms leads French fresh produce importers to negotiate with public authorities a collective self-monitoring safety agreement. This paper is a case study of such an agreement in the Perpignan import market. Its actual design poses a problem of incentive...

Despite criticism that Environmental Management Systems (EMSs) do not address social aspects, a review of the EMS implementation on Australian farms revealed that there were many social dimensions to the EMS. While these were not necessarily explicitly recognised by the farmers, certifiers...

Climate variability has been observed over a long period of time and is considered a natural process occurring on Earth. Climate change, however, is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere in addition to natural phenomena. Global...

A Pollution Control Agreement (PCA) is typically an agreement made between a local government and a business with regard to the environmental measures of the business. It can be regarded as a kind of voluntary approach (VA). In preceding case studies, it was found that PCAs played a larger role...

We develop a multiple-firm model of an industry's voluntary adoption of environmental protection measures to achieve a predetermined industry-wide emissions reduction target under an explicit threat of imposition of an emissions tax. We examine the free-riding incentive of individual firms and...

This paper analyses the conditions under which a group of firms has the incentive to sign a Voluntary Agreement (VA) in order to control its emission flows even in the presence of free-riding by other firms in the industry. For the purpose of this paper it is assumed that free-riders cannot be...