The next Penn State Water Insights Seminar will be held April 3 and features Dr. Douglas Wrenn as the speaker on “Price-Based Policies For Managing Residential Development And Impacts on Water Quality.”

Wrenn’s research combines the results from an instrumental variable duration model with a model of nutrient pollution to examine how price-based land use policies impact urban development and nitrogen and phosphorus loads.

The results provide a number of insights. First, it shows models without instrumentation significantly underestimate the impact of price-based policies. Second, it demonstrates that important tradeoffs exists between policies designed to manage development and those designed to manage water quality.

Specifically, a uniform tax on development significantly reduces acreage developed, but increases nitrogen and phosphorus loads, while a green tax designed to mitigate the impacts of development on water quality outcomes leads to increased land area being developed.

Wrenn is an Assistant Professor of Environmental Economics in the Department of Agricultural Economics, Sociology, and Education. His research focuses on environmental, urban, and land-use economic and policy issues with a specific focus on applied econometric modeling.

He is also interested in the integration of applied econometric models with biophysical models as a means of evaluating and designing more efficient policy. He has a bachelor's degree in economics from Eastern Mennonite University and a PhD in Applied Economics from the Ohio State University.

The Seminar will be held in Room 102 Forest Resources Building at Penn State in State College from Noon to 1:00.  Click Here to attend the Seminar by webinar (sign in with your name and email).

Click Here for the full schedule of Water Insights Seminar series from Penn State’s Environment and Natural Resources Institute and recordings of past Seminars.

Other Archived Water Insights Seminars:

Chesapeake Bay: Emerging Policy And Practice Innovations To Improve Water Quality Presentation Now Available Online

Water Insights Seminar: Profiting More By Farming Less? A New Paradigm For Chesapeake Watershed Water Quality

Multi-Strategy Whole Watershed Restoration For Ecological And Human Resiliency

Water Insights Seminar: What Is Water Law And Why Should Scientists Care? - Available Online.

Water Insights Seminar: Policies To Minimize Damage Caused By Aquatic Invasive Species

Water Insights Seminar: Climate Change Impacts On Wetland Hydrology

[Posted: March 28, 2018]

4/2/2018