The effects of a spruce bark beetle outbreak and wildfires on property values in the wildland–urban interface of south-central Alaska, USA

Winslow D. Hansen and Helen Naughton

Ecological Economics, 2013, vol. 96, issue C, 141-154

Abstract: Climate warming is causing the frequency, extent, and severity of natural disturbances to increase. To develop innovative approaches for mitigating the potential negative social consequences of such increases, research is needed investigating how people perceive and respond to natural disturbance. This study uses spatial econometric techniques in a hedonic pricing framework to estimate how wildfires and a spruce bark beetle (Dendroctonus rufipennis) outbreak affect assessed property values on the Kenai Peninsula of south-central Alaska in 2001 and 2010. We find that large wildfires and the spruce bark beetle outbreak increase property values while small wildfires decrease property values. These findings suggest that homeowners may form complex viewpoints, weighing enhancements to environmental amenities with negative consequences that stem from the occurrence of natural disturbance.

Keywords: Hedonic property values; Wildfire; Bark beetle outbreak; Wildland–urban interface (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q51 Q54 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800913003194
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:96:y:2013:i:c:p:141-154

DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2013.10.009

Access Statistics for this article

Ecological Economics is currently edited by C. J. Cleveland

More articles in Ecological Economics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().