THE GRAND CANYON CONTROVERSY: LESSONS FOR FEDERAL COST-BENEFIT PRACTICES
Abstract
This review and analysis of the economic controversy over the proposed Grand Canyon dams has pointed out several Federal evaluation practices not fully brought out in previous analyses of Senate Document 97: (1) The use of the Document's 'most likely' wording to exclude lower cost alternatives from consideration; (2) The inclusion of higher interest rates and taxes in evaluating a private alternative to a public project; (3) Use of unreasonable assumptions with regard to the transmission costs of alternatives; (4) The particularly inadequate interest rates used in computing the cost of proposed projects during periods when rates are relatively high compared to previous decades. The significance of the Grand Canyon controversy for the evaluation of Federal water projects goes beyond underlining the inadequacies of Senate Document 97, however, to raise the question of whether it is possible for Federal water agencies to objectively evaluate projects which they would later be asked to build.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Oct 01, 1967
- Accession Number
- AD0660118
Entities
People
- Alan Carlin
Organizations
- RAND Corporation