Papers by Sergey Rabotyagov
This paper presents an econometric technique for circumventing the lack of individual choice data... more This paper presents an econometric technique for circumventing the lack of individual choice data in a framework of binary choice model by utilizing aggregate choice data. The probability of observing a certain number of individuals making choice A out of the total number of individuals in a group is presented as a sum of probabilities of disjoint events, in which
We propose an econometric technique for estimating the parameters of a binary choice model when o... more We propose an econometric technique for estimating the parameters of a binary choice model when only aggregated data are available on the choices made. The method performs favorably in applications to both simulated and real world choice data.
The optimal pollution permit trading system is examined when the regulator, faced with incomplete... more The optimal pollution permit trading system is examined when the regulator, faced with incomplete information on firms' abatement costs and delivery coefficients, seeks to minimize expected total abatement costs to meet an ex ante pollution target. Intuitively, we find that the optimal trading ratio and permit cap are set such that there will be more pollution when abatement costs are
Despite decades of advocacy by water resource economists, water markets (leases and sales of wate... more Despite decades of advocacy by water resource economists, water markets (leases and sales of water rights between willing buyers and sellers) have largely failed to develop in the western US. Although there are a number of explanations for this failure, we explore one potential reason that has received less attention in the economics and policy literature: farmers as sellers may have preferences for different elements of a water market transaction that are not captured in the relative comparison of their profits from farming and their profits from agreeing to a deal. We recruited irrigators with senior water rights in the upper Yakima River Basin in Washington state to participate in a series of experimental auctions.
We attempt to design a market framework (which we call ECOSEL) for private provision of forest ec... more We attempt to design a market framework (which we call ECOSEL) for private provision of forest ecosystem services. ECOSEL is a non-regulatory framework that uses a voluntary public good provision mechanism (in a form of an auction) in conjunction with a multiobjective optimization algorithm to create a market for forest ecosystem services. It is expected to be attractive to the
Water Resources and Economics, 2014
ABSTRACT
IOP Conference Series: Earth and Environmental Science, 2009
ABSTRACT This article was submitted without an abstract, please refer to the full-text PDF file.
A f e w f a r me r s ' o r g a n i z a t i o n s i n I o wa , l e d by the Iowa Farm Bureau, came... more A f e w f a r me r s ' o r g a n i z a t i o n s i n I o wa , l e d by the Iowa Farm Bureau, came t o g e t h e r a n d f o r me d a p a r t n e r s h i p t o s u p p o r t a n i n i t i a t i v e t o a s s e s s t h e " s t a t e o f c o n s e r v a t i o n " o n I o wa ' s c r o p l a n d . Ot h e r p a r t n e r s i n c l u d e t h e I o wa C o r n Gr o we r s Association, the Iowa Soybean Association, and the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture. The Iowa Department of Natural Resources and Iowa Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), though not in the partnership, provided advice and e x p e r t i s e t o t h e i n i t i a t i v e . S p e c i f i c a l l y , t h e p r o j e c t ' s g o a l wa s t o p r o v i d e answers to three questions: 1) What conservation practices are currently in place in Iowa, what is their coverage, and what is the cost of these practices? 2) What are (and have been) the effects of these practices on water quality? 3) What would it take to improve water quality to obtain specific standards? With datasets available from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and other sources, some economic models, and a hydrological simulation model, the Center for Agricultural and Rural Development (CARD) at Iowa State University undertook the task of answering these questions.
This paper describes the foundations of a market mechanism that was designed to stimulate more ef... more This paper describes the foundations of a market mechanism that was designed to stimulate more efficient provisions of forest ecosystem services to society. The proposed tool is a competitive multi-unit public goods subscription game of incomplete information. A conceptual and mathematical characterization of the game is followed by an illustrative example where Pareto-efficient bundles of timber, carbon and mature forest habitat services of a real forest are used in a simulated bidding game. Attractive features of the mechanism include the use of multi-criteria optimization to ensure only the most cost-efficient bundles of ecosystem services are offered for bidding, and that it does not rely on regulatory control or on complex valuation exercises that are otherwise needed in alternative methods such as the cap-and-trade scheme.
21st Century Watershed Technology: Improving Water Quality and Environment Conference Proceedings, 29 March - 3 April 2008, Concepcion, Chile, 2008
The effectiveness of conservation practices depends on their placement on the fields within the w... more The effectiveness of conservation practices depends on their placement on the fields within the watershed. Cost-effective placement of these practices for maximum water quality benefits on each field requires comparing a very large number of possible land-use scenarios. To address this problem, we combine the tools of evolutionary algorithm with the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model and cost data to develop a trade-off frontier of least cost of achieving nutrient reductions and the corresponding locations of conservation practices. This approach was applied to the Raccoon River Watershed, which drains about 9,400 km 2 of an intensive agriculture region in west-central Iowa. Applying genetic algorithm to the calibrated SWAT modeling setup produced multitudes of optimal solutions of achieving nutrient reductions in relation to the total cost of placing these practices. For example, a 30% reduction in nitrate (and a corresponding 53% reduction in phosphorus) at the watershed outlet can be achieved with a cost of $80 million per year. This solution frontier allows policymakers and stakeholders to explicitly see the trade-offs between cost and nutrient reductions.
We apply an integrated simulation-optimization framework to search for cost-efficient mix and loc... more We apply an integrated simulation-optimization framework to search for cost-efficient mix and location of agricultural conservation practices in a typical agricultural watershed for two types of nitrogen reduction targets: control of mean annual nitrogen loadings, and a "safety-first" type constraint, insisting that nitrogen targets be met in every weather realization (weatherresilient solutions). Evolutionary algorithms are developed for each of the appropriate water quality targets. Our approach allows for the derivation of a watershed-level total and marginal nitrogen abatement cost curve. Controlling for the probability of meeting water quality targets (looking for weather-resilient solutions) is found to be significantly more costly than controlling the average nitrogen loadings. Both types of solutions are assessed for robustness with respect to weather uncertainty: solutions selected to reduce average loadings do well under weather uncertainty, while the robustness of solutions selected to be resilient decreases with the stringency of the water quality goal. , M., R. S. Govindaraju and M. M. Hantush. 2006. Cost-effective allocation of watershed management practices using a genetic algorithm. Water Resources Research 42, W10429. Arabi, M., R. S. Govindaraju and M. M. Hantush. 2007a. A probabilistic approach for analysis of uncertainty in the evaluation of watershed management practices. Journal of Hydrology 333: 459-471. Arabi, M., J. Frankenberger, B. Engel and J. Arnold. 2007b. Representation of agricultural management practices with SWAT. Hydrological Processes, doi: 10.1002/hyp.6890. Arnold, J.G. and N. Fohrer. 2005. Current capabilities and research opportunities in applied watershed modeling. Hydrological Processes 19: 563-572. Arnold, J.G. and P.M. Allen. 1999. Automated methods for estimating baseflow and groundwater recharge from streamflow record. Journal of American Water Resources Association 35(2): 411-424. Arnold, J.G., R. Srinivasan, R.S. Muttiah and J.R. Williams. 1998. Large area hydrologic modeling and assessment part I: Model development. Journal of American Water Resources Association 34(1): 73-89. Bekele, E.G. and J.W. Nicklow. 2005. Multiobjective management of ecosystem services by integrative watershed modeling and evolutionary algorithms.
European Review of Agricultural Economics, 2014
In this paper, we discuss the importance of developing integrated assessment models to support th... more In this paper, we discuss the importance of developing integrated assessment models to support the design and implementation of policies to address water quality problems associated with agricultural pollution. We describe a new modelling system, LUMI-NATE, which links land use decisions made at the field scale in the Upper Mississippi, Ohio and Tennessee Basins through both environmental and hydrological components to downstream water quality effects and hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico. This modelling system can be used to analyse detailed policy scenarios identifying the costs of the policies and their resulting benefits for improved local and regional water quality. We demonstrate the model's capabilities with a simple scenario where cover crops are incentivised with green payments over a large expanse of the watershed.
As water quality continues to be degraded by nutrients and sediment in agricultural 8 watersheds,... more As water quality continues to be degraded by nutrients and sediment in agricultural 8 watersheds, reverse auctions are receiving increased attention to cost-effectively address these 9 pollutants. Typically, reverse auctions include a selection process which depends on both the 10 monetary bid and a ranking of the environmental benefit, where the latter is often approximated 11 using simple models, such as the Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE). When the 12 environmental objective is to improve water quality, the cost-effectiveness of such ranking 13 methods cannot always be assured since simple models may poorly approximate the effects on 14 downstream water quality. In this paper, we introduce an alternative reverse auction approach 15 that takes advantage of richer watershed process models and optimization tools that are now 16 much more commonly available. This "improved" reverse auction allows decision-makers to 17 better consider the cost-effective assignment of conservation practices and to address water 18 quality or other environmental objectives. In a spatially detailed simulation, we demonstrate how 19 this approach can improve the design of a reverse auction for the Raccoon River Watershed in 20 Iowa, and estimate the potential gains from using the simulation-optimization approach relative 21 to simpler ranking methods for selecting bids. We also point out that simple bid ranking schemes 22 may not yield sufficient nutrient reductions to achieve water quality goals but bids are easily 23 selected to achieve any feasible water quality improvement in the "improved" auction process. 24 25
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Papers by Sergey Rabotyagov