Consider a general equilibrium framework where the marginal cost of extraction from several deposits of an exhaustible resource is constant in terms of an inexhaustible perfect substitute and differs between deposits. The instantaneous rate of production from the inexhaustible resource is subject to a capacity constraint. We show, under standard assumptions, that not only may it be optimal to begin using a high cost resource before a lower cost one is depleted, as shown in Kemp and Long (1980a), but it may be optimal to begin using it strictly before the lower cost one is even put into use. Thus the intuitive principle, derived from partial equilibrium analysis, that when the rate of discount is positive natural resources should always be exploited in strictly increasing order of costs, not only does not hold in a general equilibrium context, but may be totally reversed.
The research leading to these results has received funding from European Community's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under grant agreement n 266992-Global-IQ "Impacts Quantification of global changes". 2 We thank the editor and three referees for their valuable comments. We also thank Steve Salant for his precious advice which allowed us to considerably improve the present paper. Jean-Pierre Amigues also thanks all the participants in the INRA-Paris seminar, the Paris I environmental economics seminar and the EAERE Rome conference for their fruitful comments. The usual disclaimer applies.
On montre comment la contrainte d’épuisement des ressources non renouvelables sur laquelle risque de buter infinele maintien d’un niveau minimal de consommation, peut être levée grâce à un effort d’investissement adapté. Mais cet effort, initialement assez intense dans certains cas, ne doit être consenti que si la productivité dans le secteur de la recherche est suffisamment élevée au regard de l’impatience. On montre que, dans le cas d’une préférence marquée pour le présent, la société choisit une trajectoire de recherche initialement trop timide, de sorte qu’à terme, la consommation est inéluctablement amenée à régresser.
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