The United States Government recently developed a range of values representing the monetized global damages associated with an incremental increase in carbon dioxide (CO 2) emissions, commonly referred to as the social cost of carbon (SCC). These values are currently used in benefit-cost analyses to assess potential federal regulations.

Many environmental justice studies argue that firms choose to locate waste sites or polluting plants disproportionately in minority or poor communities. However, it is not uncommon for these studies to match site or plant location to contemporaneous socioeconomic characteristics instead of to characteristics at the time of siting. While this may provide important information on disproportionate impacts currently faced by these communities, it does not describe the relationship at the time of siting. Also, variables that are important to a plant's location decision – i.e., production and transportation costs – are often not included. Without controlling for such variables, it is difficult to evaluate the relative importance of socioeconomic characteristics in a firm's initial location decision. This paper examines the role of community socioeconomic characteristics at the time of siting in the location decisions of manufacturing plants while controlling for other location-relevant factors such as input costs.When plant location is matched to current socioeconomic characteristics, results are consistent with what the environmental justice literature predicts: race is significant and positively related to plant location, while income is significant and negatively related to plant location. When plant location is matched to socioeconomic characteristics at the time of siting, empirical results suggest that race is no longer significant, though income is still significant and negatively related to plant location. Poverty rates are sometimes significant but act as a deterrent to plant location. Variables traditionally considered in the firm location literature – such as land and labor costs, the quality of labor, and distance to rail – are significant. The presence of pre-existing TRI plants in a neighborhood and average plant size are also significant.

The literature on the impacts of biofuels on food prices is characterized by contradictory findings and a wide range of estimates. To bring more clarity to this issue, we review studies on U.S. corn ethanol expansion released between 2008 and 2013. Normalizing corn price impacts by the increase in corn ethanol volume, we find that each billion gallon expansion in ethanol production yields a 2-3 percent increase in corn prices on average across studies. We also conduct a meta-analysis to identify the factors that drive the remaining variation in crop price impacts across studies. We find that the modeling framework, projection year, inclusion of ethanol co-products, international biofuel production, and baseline and policy ethanol volumes explain much of the differences in price effects across studies and scenarios. Our study also distinguishes between analyses that estimate long-run equilibrium impacts of biofuels and short-run studies that consider the effects of unexpected policy or weather shocks, which can lead to temporary price spikes. We find higher impacts on corn prices per billion gallons of corn ethanol production in studies using a short-run framework; each additional billion gallons of ethanol causes a 5-10 percent increase in corn prices. Last, we examine a small number of studies that consider the implications of biofuel policies for food security worldwide. The literature suggests that biofuels expansion will raise the number of people at risk of hunger or in poverty in developing countries.

The United States Government recently concluded a year-long process to develop a range of values representing the monetized damages associated with an incremental increase in carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) emissions, commonly referred to as the social cost of carbon (SCC). These values are currently used in benefit-cost analyses to assess potential federal regulations. For 2010, the central value of the SCC is $21 per ton of CO 2 emissions and sensitivity analyses are to be conducted at $5, $35, and $65 (2007$). This paper summarizes the methodology and process used to develop the SCC values, complemented with our own commentary about how the SCC can be used to inform regulatory decisions and areas where further research would be particularly useful.JEL Codes: Q54, Q51, and Q58

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How consumers evaluate trade-offs between the cost of buying additional fuel economy and the expected fuel savings that result is an important underlying determinant of the overall cost of national fuel economy standards. Models of vehicle choice are a means to predict the change in consumers' vehicle purchase patterns, as well as the effects of these changes on compliance costs and consumer surplus. This paper surveys the literature on vehicle choice models and finds a wide range in methods and results. A large puzzle raised is whether automakers build into their vehicles as much fuel economy as consumers are willing to purchase. This paper examines possible reasons why there may be a gap between the amount consumers are willing to pay for fuel economy and the amount that automakers provide, though there is insufficient evidence on the relative roles of these various hypotheses. Further research on the role of fuel economy in consumer vehicle purchases is needed to assist in understanding the welfare effects of fuel economy regulation.

a b s t r a c tIn this paper, we evaluate the influence of two environmental policy levers on emissions in the metal-finishing industry: a voluntary program-the Strategic Goals Program (SGP)-and the threat of formal regulation. While voluntary approaches are increasingly utilized as policy tools, the effectiveness of such programs is often questioned, and the impact of a voluntary program in tandem with a regulatory threat is not well understood. We examine the decision to participate in the SGP and, conditional on that decision, determine the effects that the SGP and regulatory threat had on facility emissions behavior. Participation in the program appears related to several forms of external pressure: the regulatory threat, industry trade association membership, the level of environmental giving in a state, and a number of neighborhood characteristics. However, over the entire study period, participation in the SGP yielded little, if any, additional reductions in emissions, while the regulatory threat is correlated with significant emission reductions by both participants and non-participants. Splitting our study period into two time periods reveals a more nuanced relationship between SGP participation and emissions behavior than is evident over the entire study period. While participants do not appear to take advantage of the program initially, they make greater strides in reducing emissions than non-participants in later years. The split sample results also indicate that both participants and non-participants react strongly to the initial threat of regulation and to an increase in its relative stringency.

This paper suggests two generalizations of the deposit-refund idea. In the first, we apply the idea not just to solid waste materials, but to any waste from production or consumption-including wastes that may be solid, gaseous, or liquid. Using a simple general equilibrium model, we derive the optimal combination of a tax on a purchased commodity and subsidy to a "clean" activity (such as emission abatement, recycling, or disposal in a sanitary landfill). This "two-part instrument" is equivalent to a Pigovian tax on the "dirty" activity (such as emissions, dumping, or litter). In the second generalization, we consider the case where government must use distorting taxes on labor and capital incomes. To help meet the revenue requirement, would the optimal deposit be raised and the refund reduced? We derive the second-best revenue-raising DRS or two-part instrument to answer that question.