Economic Benefits From An Improvement In Water Quality

Until recently, there has been general agreement that improvement and preservation of water quality, though costly, provided economic and social benefits that outweighed the expense. Now, however, some observers are beginning to question whether the costs of the 1972 Water Pollution Control Act may actually exceed those benefits. This book provides answers to some of the questions that have been raised. The authors give measures of several important nonmarket benefits of improved water quality in Colorado's South Platte River Basin and empirically test and confirm the Weisbrod and Krutilla proposals that the general public may be willing to pay for preservation of environmental amenities and that option value and other preservation values must be added to recreation-use values to give an accurate picture of the social benefits of environmental preservation and restoration. Their findings include the fact that even those who do not expect to use the river basin for recreation are willing to pay for the maintenance of a natural ecosystem and to bequest clean water to future generations. The authors also arrive at average amounts households are willing to pay for improved water quality to enhance enjoyment of water-based recreation activities. They suggest that, without such information, it is highly unlikely that sufficient resources will be allocated for the preservation of unique environments and for the improvement of those being degraded.

Until recently, there has been general agreement that improvement and preservation of water quality, though costly, provided economic and social benefits that outweighed the expense. Now, however, some observers are beginning to question whether the costs of the 1972 Water Pollution Control Act may actually exceed those benefits. This book provides answers to some of the questions that have been raised. The authors give measures of several important nonmarket benefits of improved water quality in Colorado's South Platte River Basin and empirically test and confirm the Weisbrod and Krutilla proposals that the general public may be willing to pay for preservation of environmental amenities and that option value and other preservation values must be added to recreation-use values to give an accurate picture of the social benefits of environmental preservation and restoration. Their findings include the fact that even those who do not expect to use the river basin for recreation are willing to pay for the maintenance of a natural ecosystem and to bequest clean water to future generations. The authors also arrive at average amounts households are willing to pay for improved water quality to enhance enjoyment of water-based recreation activities. They suggest that, without such information, it is highly unlikely that sufficient resources will be allocated for the preservation of unique environments and for the improvement of those being degraded.

This volume brings together a number of prominent economic studies all of which deal with key water quality issues. The studies focus on the economic aspects of water quality including identifying the polluters' actions and incentives, designing and comparing control mechanisms, analyzing the costs and benefits of water quality programmes, and finally managing transboundary water quality. They all make recommendations for improving water quality through changing incentives, programmes and/or policies.

Develops a multiple parameter analytical procedure for estimating benefits of water pollution abatement.

Almost 5 years ago we began working together on research for the U.S. Environmental Protec tion Agency (EPA) to measure the benefits of water quality regulations. EPA had awarded a contract to Research Triangle Inst~ute (RTIl in response to a proposal that Bill wrote on measuring these benefits. After meeting with the EPA project officer, Dr Ann Fisher, the basic outlines of what would become this research were framed. Upon the suggestion of Bob Anderson, then chief of the Benefits Branch at EPA, we selected the Monongahela River as the focal point of a case study that would compare alternative benefit measurement approaches. Exactly how this case study would be done remained vague, but Ann urged that there be a survey and that nonuse benefits be included in the question naire design. Of course, Bill agreed. At the same time, Kerry was independently working on a review article that tied together some of the loose threads in the option value literature. He had also been thinking about how to measure option value, as well as working on ways to generalize the travel cost approach for estimating benefits of site attributes. Glenn Morris at RTI suggested that Bill have lunch with him and Kerry and that they could talk about Bill's research to see if there were any mutual interest. Over the lunch and Bill's ever present dessert in a Chapel Hill restaurant, we found out just how much we have in common.