The Economic Theory of Pollution Control

Until now, books on the economic theory of pollution control have tended to be pitched either at a very high technical level of exposition, or at a level which is too low to allow recent theoretical developments to be explained. This book covers most of these developments without resorting to mathematical models, thus making the theory accessible to a wider range of economics students and to researchers in disciplines such as engineering, urban, and environmental studies who need a nontechnical introduction to the economic analysis of pollution.

Contents: Introduction: The nature of environmental economics; the contribution of economic theory to the analysis of pollution control policy; The Theory of External Cost: Definitions of common terms; abatement costs and pollution costs; recycling; property rights; Market Failure: External costs, efficiency, and justice; property rights and market solutions; idealized markets and the obstacles to market solutions in practice; Pollution Control Policies: The objectives of policy; efficiency and justice again; control policies in an idealized setting; effluent charges, regulation, zoning and polluter subsidies; moving towards reality: policy instruments and poor information and uncertainty; target environmental standards and the choice of pollution control policy; the distributive effects of pollution control; The Way Ahead: Pollution control policy and the law; problems of law enforcement; international aspects of pollution control; the conflict between pollution control objectives and other economic and social aims as a source of political restriction on protecting the environment; References; Index.

"I recommend Paul Burrows' text on the economics of pollution control as perhaps the clearest, most concise and original treatment of the central core of pollution economics."
—Professor D. W. Pearce, University of Aberdeen