nonrenewable resources with switching costs abstract this paper considers a firm s decision to commence or to suspend extraction of a nonrenewable resource when there are start up or shut down costs for a given level of reserves the critical price that would cause an inactive mine to be opened exceeds the price that would induce an active mine to be closed as one would expect greater switching costs cause firms to be less inclined to change status this impact can be substantial even for modest switching costs possible implications of switching costs are considered including the potential for firms to abandon mines with economically valuable remaining reserves

supply of biomass bioenergy and carbon mitigation method and application this study develops an analytical framework for deriving the supply of biomass feedstock and subsequently electricity and co2 displacement generated from the biomass this systematic approach minimizes the total cost of both feedstock and electricity production and involves the determination of the optimal power plant size and the derivation of the supply curves the analytical framework is applied to the case of logging residues in the us both the theoretical and empirical results point to the importance of simultaneously considering feedstock production energy conversion and environmental benefits costs in bioenergy project development leading to useful policy implications for bioenergy development and deployment

co firing coal with wood pellets for u s electricity generation a real options analysis abstract in contrast to eu u s electric utilities are not employing the bioenergy technology of co firing wood pellets with coal this difference in employment patterns is explored within a real options analysis roa for possible u s utilization of wood pellets considering fuel price series from 2009 to 2014 for analysis these series are divided into two sub periods based on different market conditions infancy 2009 2011 and substitution 2012 2014 roa indicates co firing wood pellets with coal is feasible considering adoption during wood pellets infancy under low discount rates and long power plant lifespans a portfolio effect of employing multiple fuels underlies this result however co firing is not currently economically feasible the different adoption decisions are likely a consequence of recent cheap and abundant u s natural gas for co fired wood pellets to be feasible government incentives and or a market increase in natural gas prices appear necessary

burning wood pellets for us electricity generation a regime switching analysis abstract applying a regime switching model under the theoretic framework of real options we inspect the optimal timing boundaries for coal and coal mixed wood pellets as two alternative fuels for a power plant in georgia united states results indicate that cofiring wood pellets with coal is generally not a commercially viable option however lower level with wood pellets

higher us crop prices trigger little area expansion so marginal land for biofuel crops is limited abstract by expanding energy biomass production on marginal lands that are not currently used for crops food prices increase and indirect climate change effects can be mitigated studies of the availability of marginal lands for dedicated bioenergy crops have focused on biophysical land traits ignoring the human role in decisions to convert marginal land to bioenergy crops recent history offers insights about farmer willingness to put non crop land into crop production the 2006 09 leap in field crop prices and the attendant 64 gain in typical profitability led to only a 2 increase in crop planted area mostly in the prairie states at this rate a doubling of expected profitability from biomass crops would expand cropland supply by only 3 2 yet targets for cellulosic ethanol production in the us energy independence and security act imply boosting us planted area by 10 or more with perennial biomass crops given landowner reluctance to expand crop area with familiar crops in the short run large scale expansion of the area in dedicated bioenergy crops will likely be difficult and costly to achieve

bioenergy crop production in the united states potential quantities land use changes and economic impacts on the agricultural sector the u s departments of agriculture and energyjointly analyzed the economic potential for and impacts of large scale bioenergy cropproduction in the united states anagricultural sector model polysys wasmodified to include three potential bioenergycrops switchgrass hybrid poplar and willow at farmgate prices of us 2 44 gj anestimated 17 million hectares of bioenergycrops annually yielding 171 million dry mg ofbiomass could potentially be produced at aprofit greater than existing agricultural usesfor the land the estimate assumes highproductivity management practices are permittedon conservation reserve program lands traditional crops prices are estimated toincrease 9 to 14 percent above baseline pricesand farm income increases annually by us 6 0billion above baseline at farmgate prices of us 1 83 gj anestimated 7 9 million hectares of bioenergycrops annually yielding 55 million dry mg ofbiomass could potentially be produced at aprofit greater than existing agricultural usesfor the land the estimate assumes managementpractices intended to achieve highenvironmental benefits on conservation reserveprogram lands traditional crops prices areestimated to increase 4 to 9 percent abovebaseline prices and farm income increasesannually by us 2 8 billion above baseline

income related inequalities in mental health in great britain analysing the causes of health inequality over time using regression techniques this paper estimates the level of income related health inequality in gb in 1992 and 1998 inequality is decomposed to investigate which socio demographic factors are important contributors to health differences the paper includes a range of measured and subjective income variables to control for absolute income a relative deprivation measure is included to test the impact of income inequality on health inequality it is found that subjective financial status is a major determinant of ill health and makes a major contribution to income related inequalities in health relative deprivation is an important contributor for women but not for men

inequalities in health some international comparisons there have been many attempts to compare various dimensions of inequality between different countries including particularly those relating to income and wealth however there have been relatively few international studies of inequalities in health 2 given that as has been noted by economists as eminent as kenneth arrow and amartya sen 3 individuals states of health are contributors to welfare comparable in impact to income or wealth holdings this relative poverty of health studies is surprising it cannot be explained by lack of data such studies of health inequality as do exist generally concern mortality and the data situation here is significantly better than that for other welfare indicators such as income there are extensive data available for a large number of countries although the quality varies see united nations 1982 it is likely to be generally higher than that for income data moreover there are fewer methodological problems associated with the data for obvious reasons mortality is easier to define than income and there is no problem equivalent to that of defining the income unit

decomposing world health inequality this study explores global inequality in health status and decomposes it into within and between country inequality we rely on standardized height as our health indicator since it avoids the measurement pitfalls of more traditional measures of health such as morbidity mortality and life expectancy it also avoids measurement problems associated with using monetary variables such as income or expenditure across time or place to compare welfare our calculation of world height inequality indicates that in contrast with similar research on income inequality within country variation is the source of most inequality rather than the differences between countries

income related inequality in life years and quality adjusted life years abstract we estimate the income related inequality in sweden with respect to life years and quality adjusted life years qalys we use a large data set from sweden with over 40 000 individuals followed up for 10 16 years to estimate the survival and quality adjusted survival in different income groups for both life years and qalys we discover inequalities in health favouring the higher income groups for men women in the youngest age group 20 29 years the number of qalys is 43 7 45 7 in the lowest income decile and 47 2 49 0 in the highest income decile

biofuel excision and the viability of ethanol production in the green triangle australia abstract the promotion and use of renewable energy sources are established priorities worldwide as a way to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and promote energy security australia is committed to reach a target of 350 ml of biofuels per year by 2010 and incentives targeted to producers and consumers have been placed these incentives include zero excise until 2011 for the ethanol produced in australia and gradual increase of the taxation rates reaching the full excise of 0 125 aud per litre by 2015 this paper analyses the viability of the second generation ethanol industry in the green triangle one of the most promising australian regions for biomass production by comparing the energy adjusted pump prices of petrol and the produced ethanol under different taxation rates and forecasted oil prices major findings suggest that under the current conditions of zero fuel excise and oil prices around 80us per barrel ethanol production is viable using biomass with a plant gate cost of up to 74 aud per ton moreover the forecasted increase in oil prices have a higher impact on the price of petrol than the increased ethanol excise on the pump price of the biofuel thus by 2016 feedstock with a plant gate cost of up to 190 aud per ton might be used for ethanol production representing a flow of 1 7 million tons of biomass per year potentially mitigating 1 2 million tons of co2 by replacing fossil fuels with ethanol

application of the modified tobin s q to an uncertain energy saving project with the real options concept abstract this paper is to develop a modified tobin s q evaluation method which successfully combines the evaluation criteria of the traditional tobin s q and the real options this study provides flexible thinking for decision making criteria that is it clearly provides decision makers with a reference in choosing enter or exit strategies such as quantitative indicators references the proposed model introduces two variables stochastic process in continuous time and explores the impact of the occurrence of unexpected events on the project value so that it can more authentically response to the project value the studied issue deals with the firms that have not established energy saving equipment yet it attempts to figure out the optimal timing to adopt an energy saving investment project when it is beneficial and the optimal timing to terminate it when the continuous operation of that business is unprofitable the future discounted benefit cost ratio q follows the geometric brownian motion with the poisson jump process and the replacement of investment equipment except for the evaluation of energy saving equipment investment project the proposed model can be applied to other related project evaluation issues such as energy saving co 2 emission reduction or general investment projects

inequality aversion health inequalities and health achievement this paper addresses two issues the first is how health inequalities can be measured in such a way as to take into account policymakers attitudes towards inequality the gini coefficient and the related concentration index embody one particular set of value judgements by generalising these indices alternative sets of value judgements can be reflected the other issue addressed is how information on health inequality can be used together with information on the mean of the relevant distribution to obtain an overall measure of health achievement

the effect of mean reversion on investment under uncertainty abstract mean reverting processes are appropriate for most real option investment models yet geometric brownian motion gbm processes are generally used for tractability hassett and metcalf j econom dyn control 19 1995 1471 1488 argue that using a gbm process is justified because mean reversion has two opposing effects it brings the investment trigger closer and also reduces the conditional volatility thereby lowering the likelihood of reaching the trigger and the overall effect on investment should be negligible for most reasonable parameter values this paper extends the hassett and metcalf model by incorporating a third factor the effect of mean reversion on systematic risk the main result is that mean reversion in general does have a significant impact on investment moreover this effect could be either positive or negative depending on various factors such as project duration cost of investing interest rate etc thus it is generally inappropriate to use the gbm process to approximate a mean reverting process

options uncertainty and sunk costs an empirical analysis of land use change abstract in a real option model of land conversion incorporating return uncertainty and sunk costs optimal conversion thresholds are significantly higher than those from expected net present value models not accounting for these factors empirical tests of conversion from agriculture to forest suggest that landowners value the option to convert when making conversion decisions higher uncertainty in returns to all potential uses and lower correlation between shocks to agricultural and forest returns decreases the likelihood of conversion estimates indicate a significant impact on conversion decisions with approximations of option values ranging from 7 to 81 of the expected value of the land asset

infant mortality relative income and public policy do health outcomes depend on relative income as well as on an individual s absolute level of income we use infant mortality as a health status indicator and find a significant and positive link between infant mortality and income inequality using cross national data for 93 countries holding constant the income of each of the three poorest quintiles of a country s population we find that an increase in the income of the upper 20 of the income distribution is associated with higher not the lower infant mortality our results are robust and not just caused by the concave relationship between income and health the estimates imply a decrease in infant mortality by 1 5 for a one percentage point decrease in the income share of the richest quintile the overall results are sensitive to public policy public health care expenditure educational outcomes and access to basic sanitation and safe water can explain the inequality health relationship thus our findings support the hypothesis of public disinves

investment under alternative return assumptions comparing random walks and mean reversion abstract many recent theoretical papers have come under attack for modeling prices as geometric brownian motion this process can diverge over time implying that firms facing this price process can earn infinite profits we explore the significance of this attack and contrast investment under geometric brownian motion with investment assuming mean reversion while analytically more complex mean reversion in many cases is a more plausible assumption allowing for supply responses to increasing prices we show that cumulative investment is generally unaffected by the use of a mean reversion process rather than geometric brownian motion and provide an explanation for this result

an entry and exit model on the energy saving investment strategy with real options this paper presents an improved decision model based on the real options approach presented by ansar and sparks 2009 for the firms that have not yet established energy saving equipment under the entry and exit strategies furthermore the proposed model takes account of the inevitable equipment renewal and the occurrence of unexpected events under the poisson jump process the timing for terminating an investment when continuous operations of that business are unprofitable is also explored to realize the optimal timing of implementing the energy saving strategy the future discounted benefit b follows the geometric brownian motion with the poisson jump process and the replacement of investment equipment a numerical analysis is followed by a sensitivity study of various parameters to better realize their impacts on the entry and exit thresholds the results show that for the jump case the higher probability of occurrence of unfavorable events will result in a higher entry threshold and lower exit threshold investors are forced to request higher benefit thresholds to cover the higher probability of losses brought by unfavorable events

on solving the multirotational timber harvesting problem with stochastic prices a linear complementarity formulation this article develops a two factor real options model of the harvesting decision over infinite rotations assuming a known stochastic price process and using a rigorous hamilton jacobi bellman methodology the harvesting problem is formulated as a linear complementarity problem that is solved numerically using a fully implicit finite difference method this approach is contrasted with the markov decision process models commonly used in the literature the model is used to estimate the value of a representative stand in ontario s boreal forest both when there is complete flexibility regarding harvesting time and when regulations dictate the harvesting date

the distributional impact of health financing in europe a review this article summarises extends and updates previous empirical work on the distributional implications of alternative health care financing arrangements in a selection of european countries and the us on the one hand total health care payments are almost proportional to ability to pay in most countries this is predominantly driven by a high reliance on public financing on the other hand private payments out of pocket payments as well as private insurance premiums are highly regressive more extended reliance on private financing may therefore endanger the equitable nature of financing systems in addition private payments put a heavy burden on unfortunate households

impact of perennial energy crops income variability on the crop selection of risk averse farmers abstract the uk government policy is for the area of perennial energy crops in the uk to expand significantly farmers need to choose these crops in preference to conventional rotations for this to be achievable this paper looks at the potential level and variability of perennial energy crop incomes and the relation to incomes from conventional arable crops assuming energy crop prices are correlated to oil prices the results suggests that incomes from them are not well correlated to conventional arable crop incomes a farm scale mathematical programming model is then used to attempt to understand the affect on risk averse farmers crop selection the inclusion of risk reduces the energy crop price required for the selection of these crops however yields towards the highest of those predicted in the uk are still required to make them an optimal choice suggesting only a small area of energy crops within the uk would be expected to be chosen to be grown this must be regarded as a tentative conclusion primarily due to high sensitivity found to crop yields resulting in the proposal for further work to apply the model using spatially disaggregated data

the intensity and timing of investment the case of land the authors model the decision to replace durable capital when intensity is variable decisions of this type include land redevelopment decisions where the density of residential or commercial development is a choice variable as well as capital replacement decisions where capacity is variable the authors provide a general yet simple formation of the problem using an optimal stopping framework they characterize the value of the project the timing of investment and the intensity of development the authors show that intensity interacts in important ways with timing taxes and project values the ability to vary intensity raises hurdle rents and delays development decisions copyright 1994 by american economic association

effects of income inequality on population health new evidence from the european community household panel this study provides new evidence in order to explore the relationship between income inequality and health in the european union countries using new data from the european community household panel echp a variety of different specifications were tried using diverse dependent variables such as life expectancy at birth and child mortality the results show new support to the influence of income inequality on health indicators using aggregate data and panel techniques

random preferences towards bioenergy environmental externalities a case study of woody biomass based electricity in the southern united states article i nfo this paper contrasts alternate methodological approaches of investigating public preferences the random parameter logit rpl where tastes and preferences of respondents are assumed to be heterogeneous and the conditional logit cl approach where tastes and preferences remain fixed for individuals we conducted a choice experiment to assess preferences for woody biomass based electricity in arkansas florida and virginia reduction of co2 emissions and improvement of forest habitat by decreasing risk of wildfires and pest outbreaks were presented to respondents as attributes of using green electricity the results indicate that heterogeneous preferences might be a better fit for assessing preferences for green electricity all levels of both attributes were positive contributors to welfare but they were no statistically significant respondents expressed a positive mean marginal willingness to pay wtp for each attribute level the total wtp for green electricity per kilowatt hour was 0 049 kwh or 40 5 per capita year 1 when converted into future total annual expenditures

estimating maximum land use change potential from a regional biofuel industry abstract the maximum amount of land for growing switchgrass for ethanol is estimated for a region in the southeastern u s breakeven capacities are calculated for land in row crops hay pasture and marginal land characteristics of land categories inform potential land use change impacts as well as switchgrass profitability variable yields within and across land categories are translated into distributions of switchgrass net revenue breakeven curves are generated for a range of switchgrass prices these curves provide upper bounds for further analysis of actual switchgrass adoption in context of broader economic forces and possible policy mechanisms to minimize environmental impacts a farm gate price of 55 mg 1 is estimated for half of marginal and pasturelands to break even with switchgrass at this price only 20 of land in hay and a small fraction of row crop hectares break even half of hay and row crops hectares break even at approximately 90 mg 1 and 100 mg 1 respectively at 60 mg 1 sufficient land area can profitably produce switchgrass for ethanol to displace approximately 10 of gasoline consumed in georgia north carolina and south carolina however this price only indicates breakeven capacity implying that higher prices may be necessary to realize 10 displacement

optimal sequential plantings of corn and soybeans under price uncertainty we examine crop choice and fertilizer applications as the solution to stochastic dynamic optimization problem for an innite stream of discounted prots the ecient decision rule depends on the stochastic evolution of commodity prices fertilizer prices and the agronomic eects of rotation versus monoculture this decision rule includes an account of real option values associated with maintaining soil quality and disposition in an environment with highly uncertain future prices and irreversible past planting decisions we parameterize a baseline model for a representative acre in iowa and compare the model s predictions and prots to relatively naive shorter horizon decision rules and a eld managed with optimal fertilizer applications conditional on corn and soybeans always being rotated we also examine the

the integration of energy and agricultural markets this article addresses the evolving links between energy and agricultural markets prior to 2005 there was little correlation between energy and agricultural commodity prices in 2006 2008 with the ethanol boom in the united states there emerged a strong link between crude oil gasoline and corn prices there was little link between ethanol and corn however in late 2008 and 2009 the markets changed as ethanol production came under severe economic pressure and 2 billion out of 12 billion gallons of capacity shut down during this period ethanol became priced more on corn as the breakeven corn price helped drive the ethanol market this article explores the drivers in these markets as well as other major issues facing the corn ethanol industry in the united states such as the blend wall the article concludes with a review of prospects of a future cellulosic biofuels industry

economic potential of biomass based fuels for greenhouse gas emission mitigation use of biofuels diminishes fossil fuelcombustion thereby also reducing net greenhousegas emissions however subsidies are neededto make agricultural biofuel productioneconomically feasible to explore the economicpotential of biofuels in a greenhouse gasmitigation market we incorporate data onproduction and biofuel processing for thedesignated energy crops switchgrass hybridpoplar and willow in an u s agriculturalsector model along with data on traditionalcrop livestock production and processing andafforestation of cropland net emissioncoefficients on all included agriculturalpractices are estimated through crop growthsimulation models or taken from the literature potential emission mitigation policies ormarkets are simulated via hypothetical carbonprices at each carbon price level theagricultural sector model computes the newmarket equilibrium revealing agriculturalcommodity prices regionally specificproduction input use and welfare levels environmental impacts and adoption ofalternative management practices such asbiofuel production results indicate no rolefor biofuels below carbon prices of 40 perton of carbon equivalent at these incentivelevels emission reductions via reduced soiltillage and afforestation are more costefficient for carbon prices above 70 biofuels dominate all other agriculturalmitigation strategies

production and spatial distribution of switchgrass and miscanthus in the united states under uncertainty and sunk cost abstract the u s cellulosic biofuel mandate has not been enforced in recent years uncertainty surrounding the enforcement of the mandate in addition to high production and harvest cost have contributed to a delay in the widespread planting of bioenergy crops such as switchgrass and miscanthus previous literature has shown that under uncertainty and sunk cost an investment threshold is further increased due to the value associated from holding the investment option in this paper we extend the previous literature by applying a real option switching model to bioenergy crop production first we calculate the county level break even price which triggers a switching away from traditional field crops corn soybeans and wheat to bioenergy crops under various scenarios differing by commodity prices production cost and biomass price expectations we show that the resulting break even prices at the county level can be substantially higher than previously estimated due to the inclusion of the option value in a second step we identify counties that are most likely to grow switchgrass or miscanthus by simulating a stochastic biomass price over time our results highlight two issues first switchgrass or miscanthus are not grown in the midwest under any scenario under low agricultural residue removal rates biomass crops are mostly grown in the southeast second under the assumption of a high removal rates bioenergy crops are not grown anywhere in the u s since the cellulosic biofuel mandate can be covered by agricultural residues

switching to perennial energy crops under uncertainty and costly reversibility we study a farmer s decision to convert traditional cropland into land for growing dedicated energy crops taking into account sunk conversion costs and uncertainties in crop returns the optimal decision rules differ significantly from the expected net present value rule which ignores uncertainties and from real options models that allow only one way conversion into energy crops these models also predict drastically different patterns of land conversions into and out of energy crops over time using corn soybean rotation and switchgrass as examples we show that the model predictions are sensitive to assumptions about stochastic processes of the returns government policies might have unintended consequences subsidizing conversion costs into switchgrass may not much affect proportions of land in switchgrass in the long run

regulated and unregulated substitutes aversion effects of an ethanol mandate i introduction regulation is a tool policymakers can use to steer markets away from private outcomes deemed to be socially suboptimal or inefficient regulations work either by altering market incentives or changing consumers choice sets as they attempt to reshape or restrict private market equilibria they can sometimes lead to unexpected consumer reactions and unanticipated consequences such as higher consumer costs or reduced effectiveness in meeting goals the extent to which a regulation can have adverse and unanticipated consequences depends on the nature and design of the regulation in this article we highlight a case where the design of an unpopular and hurried regulation led to especially adverse consequences the case is that of the recent ethanol mandate in the state of new south wales nsw australia ethanol mandates have become popular with legislators over the past decade and currently 62 countries have some form of one grfa 2014 a typical mandate requires producers to blend a certain percentage or certain volume of ethanol into the overall supply of gasoline the u s mandate for example requires 18 2 billion gallons of renewable fuels primarily ethanol be blended into the gasoline supply in 2014 up from 16 6 billion in 2013 epa 2013 the european union mandate requires 5 75 renewable fuels in gasoline by 2010 and 10 by 2020 eu 2003 2009 ethanol mandates have been controversial however griffin 2013 grafton kompas and van long 2012 rodriguez et al 2009 serra and zilberman 2013 westbrook et al 2014 and others proponents argue they help slow greenhouse gas accumulation promote renewable energy and reduce dependence on foreign oil they also point out benefits to the domestic farming and ethanol production industries which is sometimes a goal in itself critics on the other hand question their environmental value the need for fossil fuel replacement the lower energy yield and potential for food price inflation when crops grown for food are converted to ethanol use carter rausser and smith 2013 1 they also point out that ethanol blends tend to be more expensive for consumers on an energy adjusted basis than unblended gasoline mandates tend to be on net unpopular with consumers 2 an important consideration when transitioning to a new ethanol mandate or a higher ethanol blend under an existing mandate is ensuring compatibility with the vehicle fleet ethanol is an alcohol and in higher concentrations can be corrosive to engine valves seals and gaskets in older vehicles not designed with ethanol s properties in mind an option many jurisdictions have used in implementing ethanol mandates is to limit the ethanol blend to a level tested and widely believed to be compatible with the vast majority of vehicles on the road in the united states and canada for example a 10 blend has been implemented almost universally while a 5 blend has been used universally in many european countries if regulators instead deem that higher blends are desirable another option is to mandate that newly built vehicles be compatible with the new higher blend and then implement the fuel mandate once the vehicle fleet has largely turned over however vehicle turnover can take decades and this approach has not been as popular with regulators a third option that has found some favor is to introduce a higher ethanol blend that a majority of vehicles can use while still making the previous possibly ethanol free blend available as long as there are those who still need it in principle this dual blend approach promises to accommodate more aggressive ethanol mandates and lead to more ethanol in the fuel supply more quickly however we show that this kind of dual blend or selective mandate in its efforts to hurry ethanol blending beyond the capabilities of the vehicle fleet as a whole or beyond the confidence of consumers in its safety can have severe negative consequences

species preservation and biodiversity value a real options approach abstract we evaluate biodiversity in a real options framework when the resources in use are substitutable we examine optimal conservation decisions given that a biodiversity loss is irreversible and that future use values are uncertain while species substitutability has been shown to reduce the value of diversity we show that the flexibility associated with substitutability is a source of value marginal species value is decreasing in the number of species but rising and convex in the value of the marginal species as we show in the two species homogenous model increased volatility raises biodiversity value and a positive correlation between species values both reduces the value of the pool of species and the value of biodiversity the role played by the correlation between the value of a species and the value of other species is reminiscent of the beta of a financial asset just like an asset with a negative beta derives additional value by providing insurance against fluctuations in the market portfolio a species whose value tends to move in the opposite direction as the species in use derives additional value from its higher probability to be available for substitution if the value of the species in use diminishes

effects of corn stover year to year supply variability and market structure on biomass utilization and cost the availability of corn stover can vary considerably from year to year in a region due to annual changes in yield and area planted with corn such variations interacting with biomass market structures can affect biomass cost and utilization rate this study first characterizes year to year variations in corn stover supply for the us in general and for selected major us corn producing counties in particular there have been 20 30 year to year variations in stover supply in the us since 1975 game theoretic analysis is then applied to examining corn stover utilization rate and production cost in three market structures the analysis reveals that a free market structure will take the form of oligopoly oligopsony where large stover supply variations will expose both biorefineries and farmers to significant price volatility price equilibrium will shift significantly from year to year of the three market structures analysed the derisked supply market structure will be most favorable to biorefineries and farmers under this structure biorefineries will maintain a stover supply region that is based on derisked lower than average yield density to buffer for the supply uncertainty associated with annual variations this market structure results in significantly less volatility in biomass cost while on average only 63 of collectable stover will be used for biofuel production our findings suggest that year to year variation in corn stover availability will increase feedstock cost and reduce its potential for biofuel production

public financing of health expenditures insurance and health outcomes the effects of public financing of health expenditures insurance coverage and other factors on health outcomes are examined within health production models estimated using 1960 1992 data across 20 oecd countries mortality rates are found to depend on the mix of health care expenditures and the type of health insurance coverage increases in the publicly financed share of health expenditures are associated with increases in mortality rates increases in inpatient and ambulatory insurance coverage are associated with reduced mortality the effects of gdp health expenditures and age structure on mortality are similar to those in previous studies tobacco use alcohol use fat consumption female labour force participation and education levels are also significantly related to overall mortality rates increases in income inequality are associated with lower mortality rates suggesting that the negative relationship between inequality and health outcomes suggested by some previous studies does not remain w

competition and equity in health care markets we provide a model where hospitals compete on quality under fixed prices to investigate how hospital competition affects i quality differences between hospitals and as a result ii health inequalities across hospitals and patient severities the answer to the first question is ambiguous and depends on factors related to both demand and supply of health care whether competition increases or reduces health inequalities depends on the type and measure of inequality health inequalities due to the postcode lottery are more likely to decrease if the marginal health gains from quality decrease at a higher rate whereas health inequalities between high and low severity patients decrease if patient composition effects are sufficiently small we also investigate the effect of competition on health inequalities as measured by the gini and the generalised gini coefficients and highlight differences compared to the simpler dispersion measures

modeling biomass procurement tradeoffs within a cellulosic biofuel cost model abstract we develop a long run cellulosic biofuel cost model that minimizes feedstock procurement and processing costs per gallon the distinguishing feature of the model is that it accounts for the procurement tradeoff between the intensive margin biomass producers participation rate and extensive margin biomass capture region to investigate the extent to which this procurement tradeoff affects processors cost minimizing decisions we apply the model to switchgrass ethanol production in u s crop reporting districts results suggest that location characteristics will determine the extent to which processors can reduce their total procurement costs by offering a higher biomass price to increase participation near the plant and reduce transportation costs

corn ethanol plant investment a real options case study the objective of this article is to describe an investment decision using net present value and real options a case study describes the data and the corn ethanol industry so students can study a cooperative s decision of whether or not to invest in a new corn ethanol plant in 2015 nebraska an extensive set of information accompanies this case including spreadsheets with data computer software code lesson plans for teaching real options and net present value and an extensive teaching note

optimal fishery management with regime shifts an assessment of harvesting strategies this paper compares outcomes from informed and uninformed harvesting strategies for a fish stock with switching dynamics where the probability of switching is influenced by climate using data on sea surface temperature anomalies the impacts of climate on the conservation and the welfare that can be extracted from the stock are investigated results indicate that an informed management policy leads to stock biomass and resource rents that are up to 2 7 and 2 times higher respectively than under an uninformed policy also the fishery is open 54 longer under the informed policy the magnitude of these effects depends on the choice of the discount rate indicating that when the future is highly discounted gains from the informed policy dissipate