Join us for the next Baker Center Energy and Environmental Forum, which will
take place on Thursday, September 26 at 3.30 pm in Dougherty Engineering
Room 416 (not Toyota Auditorium in Baker Center due to a scheduling conflict).
 
James Shortle, Professor of Agricultural and Environmental Economics, and
Director of the Environment and Natural Resources Institute, at Penn State
University will give a 45 minute presentation and then lead a discussion with
participants. His talk is titled:
 
“Towards a Science of Water Quality Trading”
 
Abstract: The potential for pollution trading in markets to efficiently achieve
environmental-quality goals is one of the major conceptual innovations for
environmental policy coming from economic research. Successful applications
in air pollution control have contributed to interest in using trading in other
environmental domains. However, water pollution problems generally do not
conform closely to the assumptions of conventional economic models of
efficient trading. I will describe challenges to the design of water pollution
markets that can efficiently manage water pollution. I will describe how recent
experiments in water quality trading have attempted to address these issues in
water quality protection and offer lessons for market design. Finally, I will offer
suggestions for key elements of a multi-disciplinary approach for determining
and realizing the promise of water quality markets.
 
James Shortle is the University Distinguished Professor of Agricultural and
Environmental Economics, and Director of the Environment and Natural
Resources Institute, at Penn State University. He received his PhD in
Economics from Iowa State University in 1981 and has been at Penn State
since. His current research focuses on the design of economic incentives and
markets for water quality protection, environmental policy for agriculture, and
impacts of climate change on agriculture and water resources. He is a member
of the Environmental Economics Advisory Committee to the US EPA Science
Advisory Board, and recently served on the National Research Council
Committee on Science for EPAs Future.
 
NOTE: The forum will be meeting in Room 416 of the Dougherty Engineering
Building on the Northeast corner side of campus (1512 Middle Drive behind
Dabney-Buehler and the SERF building and beside Ming Kao).