The Economics of Non-Point-Source Pollution

Anastasios Xepapadeas

Annual Review of Resource Economics, 2011, vol. 3, issue 1, 355-373

Abstract: Non-point-source (NPS) pollution refers to a form of pollution in which neither the source nor the size of specific emissions can be observed or identified with sufficient accuracy. In NPS pollution the ambient concentration of pollutants associated with the individually unobserved emissions is typically observed. NPS pollution due to agricultural runoff is a major source of water pollution, eutrophication, and hypoxia. Due to informational asymmetries and stochastic effects, the use of traditional environmental policy instruments such as emissions taxes or tradable quotas to regulate NPS pollution is very difficult. This article reviews the main theoretical approaches, up to the present, to the regulation of NPS pollution—input-based schemes, ambient schemes, and endogenous monitoring—and discusses issues associated with NPS pollution regulation and their relation to the theoretically proposed instruments.

Keywords: diffused source pollution; input-based schemes; ambient schemes; endogenous monitoring; moral hazard; uncertainty (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q52 Q53 Q58 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (20)

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Working Paper: The Economics of Nonpoint Source Pollution (2012)
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