Environmental and Resource Economics

Description

This is an intermediate level course in which students familiarize with the concepts and methods of ecological, environmental and natural resources economics and with the international dimension of environmental economics (with a focus on trade, climate change, ….). Students explore how economics can help us understand the causes of a series of important environmental problems (water and soil pollution, biodiversity loss, air pollution) and can derive policy implications for environmental protection. Students know how to do a project appraisal. They can assess projects using a cost-benefit analysis and can apply a cost-benefit analysis to the environment. They know some alternatives to cost-benefit analysis. Students can value the environment using stated preference methods (choice experiments and contingent valuation methods) and revealed preference methods (travel cost method, hedonic pricing method).