The Economic Benefits of International Environmental Investments Establishing a Framework.
Abstract
The connection between the economy and the environment has generally remained unexplored. The Logistics Management Institute decided to investigate whether the indirect benefits of environmental investments could be identified and quantified, thus enabling the inclusion of environmental issues in traditional economics-oriented decision-making processes. We were unable to find any existing environmental assessment models or economic development models that we could use as a generally accepted framework for modeling the link between the economy and the environment. Consequently, we modeled the environmental sector as a module of the Threshold-2l simulation that is being constructed by the Millennium Institute to investigate sustainable development issues. The general concept of our environmental model is that activity in the economic sectors creates associated pollutant emissions, which in turn affect the quality or quantity of the resource pool - air, water, soil, and natural resources. Those impacts are moderated by production technology and by investments in pollution control equipment; they are further modified by the levels of regulatory control and enforcement that are in place. We expressed those interrelationships in an equation. This report on a work in progress is being published in order to engage a wider research community in addressing the many unknowns that continue to exist in this area.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Apr 01, 1996
- Accession Number
- ADA312514
Entities
People
- Denise Dellovade
- Douglas M. Brown
- Michael Siegel
Organizations
- LMI