Annual Review of Environment and Resources - Volume 22, 1997
Volume 22, 1997
- Preface
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- Review Articles
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THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE SCIENCE OF AQUATIC ECOSYSTEMS
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 1–11More Less▪ AbstractRuth Patrick's scientific career has been devoted to the study of freshwater organisms in water. It started with studies of diatoms. She found one could interpret the condition of water by studying diatoms. This study of the ecology of diatoms expanded into ecological studies of communities of organisms that live in streams. By shifts in the structure of communities she was able to show the effects of various types of pollution on the aquatic ecosystem. This was the first time an organized team of biologists had been used to study the effects of pollution in streams. Through this research she showed that freshwater ecosystems were characterized by large numbers of species with very different environmental requirements operating in each stage of nutrient and energy transfer in the food web. These species belonged to many different phylogenetic groups. This redundancy gives stability to the system.
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MY EDUCATION IN MINERAL (ESPECIALLY OIL) ECONOMICS
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 13–46More Less▪ AbstractThe crude oil and natural gas markets have a long colorful history. To understand them, one needs some economic theory. The dominant view, of a fixed mineral stock, implies that a unit produced today means one less in the future. As mankind approaches the limit, it must exert ever more effort per unit recovered. This concept is false, whether stated as common sense or as elegant theory. Under competition, the price results from endless struggle between depletion and increasing knowledge. But sellers may try to control the market in order to offer less and charge more. The political results may feed back upon market behavior. These factors—depletion, knowledge, monopoly, and politics—must be analyzed separately before being put together to capture a slice of a changing history.
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THE ROLE OF MOISTURE TRANSPORT BETWEEN GROUND AND ATMOSPHERE IN GLOBAL CHANGE1
D. Rind, C. Rosenzweig, and M. StieglitzVol. 22 (1997), pp. 47–74More Less▪ AbstractProjections of the effect of climate change on future water availability are examined by reviewing the formulations used to calculate moisture transport between the ground and the atmosphere. General circulation models and climate change impact models have substantially different formulations for evapotranspiration, so their projections of future water availability often disagree, even though they use the same temperature and precipitation forecasts. General circulation models forecast little change in tropical and subtropical water availability, while impact models show severe water and agricultural shortages. A comparison of observations and modeling techniques shows that the parameterizations in general circulation models likely lead to an underestimate of the impacts of global warming on soil moisture and vegetation. Such errors would crucially affect the temperature and precipitation forecasts used in impact models. Some impact model evaporation formulations are probably more appropriate than those in general circulation models, but important questions remain. More observations are needed, especially in the vicinity of forests, to determine appropriate parameterizations.
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TERRESTRIAL ECOSYSTEM FEEDBACKS TO GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 75–118More Less▪ AbstractAnthropogenic greenhouse gases are expected to induce changes in global climate that can alter ecosystems in ways that, in turn, may further affect climate. Such climate-ecosystem interactions can generate either positive or negative feedbacks to the climate system, thereby either enhancing or diminishing the magnitude of global climate change. Important terrestrial feedback mechanisms include CO2 fertilization (negative feedbacks), carbon storage in vegetation and soils (positive and negative feedbacks), vegetation albedo (positive feedbacks), and peatland methane emissions (positive and negative feedbacks). While the processes involved are complex, not readily quantifiable, and demonstrate both positive and negative feedback potential, we conclude that the combined effect of the feedback mechanisms reviewed here will likely amplify climate change relative to current projections that have not yet adequately incorporated these mechanisms.
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TRANSITION-COST ISSUES FOR US ELECTRICITY UTILITIES1
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 119–154More Less▪ AbstractThe US electric-utility industry is in the midst of major changes. These changes include deintegration of the industry and substantial increases in competition. A major consequence of these changes is the exposure of transition costs. These costs, which amount to $100–$200 billion nationwide, reflect the differences between regulated prices for electricity generation and the prices that might occur in fully competitive power markets. The large financial stakes, equivalent to nearly the total value of US electric-utility common stock, guarantee controversy. Debates occur over transition-cost amounts; analytical and market methods to estimate these costs; the assets and liabilities to include in such calculations; the assumptions used in developing these estimates; approaches that can be used to offset some of these costs; the allocation of the remaining costs among utility shareholders, different classes of retail customers, independent power producers and other wholesale suppliers, and taxpayers; and appropriate cost-recovery mechanisms.
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THE DISTRIBUTED UTILITY:A New Electric Utility Planning and Pricing Paradigm
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 155–185More Less▪ AbstractThe distributed utility concept provides an alternate approach to guide electric utility expansion. The fundamental idea within the distributed utility concept is that particular local load increases can be satisfied at least cost by avoiding or delaying the more traditional investments in central generation capacity, bulk transmission expansion, and local transmission and distribution upgrades. Instead of these investments, the distributed utility concept suggests that investments in local generation, local storage, and local demand-side management technologies can be designed to satisfy increasing local demand at lower total cost. Critical to installation of distributed assets is knowledge of a utility system's area- and time-specific costs. This review introduces the distributed utility concept, describes an application of ATS costs to investment planning, discusses the various motivations for further study of the concept, and reviews relevant literature. Future research directions are discussed.
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RENEWABLE ENERGY TECHNOLOGY AND POLICY FOR DEVELOPMENT
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 187–215More Less▪ AbstractThe costs and performance of renewable energy technologies have reached the stage where the number of economical applications in developing countries is increasing, particularly in the grid and off-grid markets for electricity. The paper provides a review of policies. The conclusions are as follows. (a) Investments in renewable energy should be helped by competition and regulatory reform in the energy industry, in the electricity industry in particular, since such reforms should reduce the subsidies, which historically have permeated the countries' industries, for electricity production from fossil and hydro resources. (b) The scope for further cost reductions is appreciable in all key technologies. There are positive externalities to investment, in the sense that each generation of investments is acting to reduce the costs of future generations; such benefits ideally need to be recognized in tax and regulatory policies and in budgetary allocations for research and development (R&D) and education and training. (c) The environmental advantages of renewable energy will become more apparent as developing countries begin to introduce their environmental policies on fossil fuels. The paper also evaluates the economists' recommendations for carbon taxes, which would favor renewable energy investments. The case for such taxes has been widely ignored by policy makers. The paper suggests that (d ) a more workable and focused policy would be to accelerate the development of the “renewable energy option”; this would be economically beneficial in itself and at the same time would reduce the uncertainties and costs of responding to the challenges posed by climate change.
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AN ASSESSMENT OF WORLD HYDROCARBON RESOURCES
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 217–262More Less▪ AbstractAssessments of global coal, oil, and natural gas occurrences usually focus on conventional hydrocarbon reserves, i.e. those occurrences that can be exploited with current technology and present market conditions. The focus on reserves seriously underestimates long-term global hydrocarbon availability. Greenhouse gas emissions based on these estimates may convey the message that the world is running out of fossil fuels, and as a result, emissions would be reduced automatically. If the vast unconventional hydrocarbon occurrences are included in the resource estimates and historically observed rates of technology change are applied to their mobilization, the potential accessibility of fossil sources increases dramatically with long-term production costs that are not significantly higher than present market prices. Although the geographical hydrocarbon resource distribution varies significantly, a regional breakdown for 11 world regions indicates that neither hydrocarbon resource availability nor costs are likely to become forces that automatically would help wean the global energy system from the use of fossil fuel during the next century.
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ELECTRIC POWER QUALITY
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 263–303More Less▪ AbstractThe quality of electric power depends on the power network topology, the amount of harmonic pollution injected in the network by nonlinear loads, and the severity of switching transients. Many of the loads encountered in modern power electronics, such as arc and induction furnaces, welders, motor drives, and many types of converters, cause a significant level of harmonic pollution and/or recurrent voltage transients. This paper describes the major sources of disturbances that affect electric service quality and explains the indices that help quantify the severity of disturbances. The loads that are most sensitive to power quality are discussed, and techniques intended to avoid or mitigate power quality problems are detailed. Finally, a brief survey of the cost of harmonic pollution and consumer outages is presented.
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GEOTHERMAL ENERGY FROM THE EARTH: Its Potential Impact as an Environmentally Sustainable Resource
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 305–356More Less▪ AbstractGeothermal energy technology is reviewed in terms of its current impact and future potential as an energy source. In general, the geothermal energy resource base is large and well distributed globally. Geothermal systems have a number of positive social characteristics (they are simple, safe, and adaptable systems with modular 1–50 MW [thermal (t) or electric (e)] plants capable of providing continuous baseload, load following, or peaking capacity) and benign environmental attributes (negligible emissions of CO2, SOx, NOx, and particulates, and modest land and water use). Because these features are compatible with sustainable growth of global energy supplies in both developed and developing countries, geothermal energy is an attractive option to replace fossil and fissile fuels. In 1997, about 7,000 MWe of base-load generating capacity and over 15,000 MWt of heating capacity from high-grade geothermal resources are in commercial use worldwide. A key question is whether these levels can grow to a point where geothermal energy is more universally available and thus have a significant impact on global energy supplies in the twenty-first century. Such an achievement will require the economic development of low-grade resources.
The current status of commercial and emerging technologies for electric power production and direct heat use is reviewed for the major geothermal resources including hydrothermal, geopressured, hot dry rock, and magma. Typically, high-temperature resources (>150°C) provide base-load generating capacity while lower-temperature resources provide energy for geothermally assisted heat pumps and for direct use in domestic, agricultural, and aquacultural heating applications. Critical development issues relating to resource quality and distribution, drilling costs, and reservoir productivity are discussed in the context of their economic impact on production costs. Advanced drilling and improved heat mining methods are suggested as approaches to increase the worldwide use of geothermal energy by reducing field development costs. With these improvements, lower-grade resources can compete in growing global energy markets that are currently controlled by abundant and low-cost fossil fuels.
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INTERNATIONAL TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER FOR CLIMATE CHANGE MITIGATION AND THE CASES OF RUSSIA AND CHINA
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 357–401More Less▪ AbstractThe environmental agenda for mitigating climate change through international transfers of technology is linked with a diverse literature, reviewed here within a framework that combines technological, agent/agenda, and market/transaction perspectives. Literature that bears on international technology transfer for climate change mitigation is similar in many w ays for Russia and China: opportunities for energy efficiency and renewable energy, economic reform and restructuring, the difficulties enterprises face in responding to market conditions, international assistance policies, international joint ventures, market intermediation, and capacity building for market development. In both countries, capacity building means enhancing market-oriented capabilities in addition to technological capabilities. For Russia, institutional development is critical, such as new commercial legal codes and housing-sector changes beyond privatization. For China, technology policies and modernization programs significantly influence technology transfers.
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MANAGING MILITARY URANIUM AND PLUTONIUM IN THE UNITED STATES AND THE FORMER SOVIET UNION
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 403–486More Less▪ AbstractEffective approaches to the management of plutonium and highly enriched uranium (HEU)—the essential ingredients of nuclear weapons—are fundamental to controlling nuclear proliferation and providing the basis for deep, transparent, and irreversible reductions in nuclear weapons stockpiles. The collapse of the Soviet Union and the ongoing dismantlement of tens of thousands of nuclear weapons are creating unprecedented stresses on the systems for managing these materials, as well as unprecedented opportunities for cooperation to improve these systems. In this article, we summarize the technical background to this situation, and the current and prospective security challenges posed by military stockpiles of these materials in the United States and Russia. We then review the programs in place to address these challenges, the progress of these programs to date, and the work remaining to be done, in five areas: (a) preventing theft and smuggling of nuclear warheads and fissile materials; (b) building a regime of monitored reductions in nuclear warhead and fissile material stockpiles; (c) ending further production of excess fissile materials; (d ) reducing stockpiles of excess fissile materials; and (e) avoiding economic collapse in the nuclear cities where substantial fractions of these materials and their guardians reside.
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CODES OF ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT PRACTICE: Assessing Their Potential as a Tool for Change
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 487–535More LessCodes of environmental management practice emerged as a tool of environmental policy in the late 1980s. Industry and other groups have developed codes for two purposes: to change the environmental behavior of participating firms and to increase public confidence in industry's commitment to environmental protection. This review examines five codes of environmental management practice: Responsible Care, the International Chamber of Commerce's Business Charter for Sustainable Development, ISO 14000, the CERES Principles, and The Natural Step. The first three codes have been drafted and promoted primarily by industry; the others have been developed by non-industry groups. These codes have spurred participating firms to introduce new practices, including the institution of environmental management systems, public environmental reporting, and community advisory panels. The extent to which codes are introducing a process of cultural change is considered in terms of four dimensions: new consciousness, norms, organization, and tools.
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REGIONAL PHOTOCHEMICAL AIR QUALITY MODELING:Model Formulations, History, and State of the Science
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 537–588More Less▪ AbstractRegional air quality models have been used for scientific investigation of trace species dynamics for over two decades and are now beginning to take a central position in air quality management. In particular, they have been used for studying the transport and fate of atmospheric acids, photochemical oxidants (e.g. ozone), and more recently, aerosols. Such models are based on numerically solving the mass conservation equations for a chemically interacting system of species and are applied to horizontal domains of 1000s of kms. Primary applications include assessing the response of pollutant concentrations to emissions controls, quantifying the flux of pollutants across and out of a region, and understanding the impact of specific processes on pollutant concentrations.
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INTEGRATED ASSESSMENT MODELS OF GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE
Vol. 22 (1997), pp. 589–628More Less▪ AbstractWe review recent work in the integrated assessment modeling of global climate change. This field has grown rapidly since 1990. Integrated assessment models seek to combine knowledge from multiple disciplines in formal integrated representations; inform policy-making, structure knowledge, and prioritize key uncertainties; and advance knowledge of broad system linkages and feedbacks, particularly between socioeconomic and biophysical processes. They may combine simplified representations of the socioeconomic determinants of greenhouse gas emissions, the atmosphere and oceans, impacts on human activities and ecosystems, and potential policies and responses. We summarize current projects, grouping them according to whether they emphasize the dynamics of emissions control and optimal policy-making, uncertainty, or spatial detail. We review the few significant insights that have been claimed from work to date and identify important challenges for integrated assessment modeling in its relationships to disciplinary knowledge and to broader assessment seeking to inform policy- and decision-making.
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Previous Volumes
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Volume 49 (2024)
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Volume 48 (2023)
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Volume 47 (2022)
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Volume 46 (2021)
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Volume 45 (2020)
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Volume 44 (2019)
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Volume 43 (2018)
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Volume 42 (2017)
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Volume 41 (2016)
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Volume 40 (2015)
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Volume 39 (2014)
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Volume 38 (2013)
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Volume 37 (2012)
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Volume 36 (2011)
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Volume 35 (2010)
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Volume 34 (2009)
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Volume 33 (2008)
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Volume 32 (2007)
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Volume 31 (2006)
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Volume 30 (2005)
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Volume 29 (2004)
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Volume 28 (2003)
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Volume 27 (2002)
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Volume 26 (2001)
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Volume 25 (2000)
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Volume 24 (1999)
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Volume 23 (1998)
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Volume 22 (1997)
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Volume 21 (1996)
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Volume 20 (1995)
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Volume 19 (1994)
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Volume 18 (1993)
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Volume 17 (1992)
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Volume 16 (1991)
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Volume 15 (1990)
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Volume 14 (1989)
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Volume 13 (1988)
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Volume 12 (1987)
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Volume 11 (1986)
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Volume 10 (1985)
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Volume 9 (1984)
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Volume 8 (1983)
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Volume 7 (1982)
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Volume 6 (1981)
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Volume 5 (1980)
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Volume 4 (1979)
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Volume 3 (1978)
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Volume 2 (1977)
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Volume 1 (1976)
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Volume 0 (1932)