Applying personal carbon trading: a proposed ‘Carbon,Health and Savings System’ for British Columbia,Canada

Addressing climate change requires the synergy of technological, behavioural and market mechanisms. This article proposes a policy framework that integrates the three, deploying personal carbon trading as a key element within a policy portfolio to reduce personal carbon footprints. It draws on policy and human motivation literatures that address the behavioural changes that may be needed in the context of a long-term threat such as climate change. This proposal builds on an analysis of the British Columbia carbon tax, international examples of carbon pricing instruments and strategies for behavioural change such as social networks, loyalty management, mobile apps and gamification. Interviews were conducted with experts in financial services, energy conservation and clean technology, as well as with specialists in climate, health and taxation policy. Their input, together with a review of the theoretical literature and practical case studies, informed the proposed design of a Carbon, Health and Saving System for promoting individual engagement and collective action by linking long-term climate mitigation measures with short-term personal and social goals, including health, recreation and social reinforcement.

Policy Relevance

This article identifies areas for climate policy innovation and recommends policies that can support, promote and enable personal carbon budgeting and collective action. Although this study is focused on British Columbia, both the input provided by key opinion leaders and the proposed framework are applicable to other jurisdictions.

This policy proposal shows how personal carbon trading could work in the context of a Canadian province with an existing climate mitigation policy. It also specifies a minimum viable product approach to establishing the economic, social and technological foundations for personal carbon trading.

The Carbon, Health and Saving System identifies the technologies and stakeholders needed to implement personal carbon trading, and offers the possibility of motivating a widespread conscious human response in the event that carbon taxation proves insufficient to generate economic adaptation in a changing climate.     

当代生态经济的综合研究综述

可持续发展战略的规划设计需要生态经济学的综合研究思想。在总结国内外关于生态经济综合研究资料的基础上,系统总结了一门新兴学科——生态经济学的研究历程、研究内容和方法。生态经济学的综合研究,关键是将人类社会经济系统视为生态系统的一个子系统,认为人类社会的发展依赖于生态系统的支持。其研究是在微观层次上对经济系统和生态系统进行有机结合的具体尝试。从发展与环境之间关系的讨论入手,系统地分析总结了生态经济学与经济学、生态学以及其它学科之间的关系和作用,西方生态经济学早期和当代的研究状况和我国生态经济学的研究状况及进展,最后从可持续发展的定量衡量和生态经济模型的建立两方面介绍了目前流行的生态经济学研究方法。     

关于加强地质经济管理若干问题的思考

通过对地勘单位资金短缺,资产质量低下等现状剖析,提出加强资金、资产管理,降低资金成本和费用支出的设想和具体办法,向管理要效益,使地勘经济健康发展。     

Economics of a Baltic Sea sustainability approach

Politics, economics and science interpret the concept of sustainability differently. The discussion distinguishes between economic, environmental and social sustainability. While advocates of economic sustainability assume that natural capital is substitutable by humanmade capital, policies for a sustainable development are questionable. The paper therefore highlights a regional case to show that sustainability is indivisible. Moreover, economics and policies serving Baltic sustainability need a new institutional network to manage the multispecies resource with participation of the social players and by addressing targets step by step. The findings are based on a simple ecological-economic model providing insights for the negotiation game for all players. In addition, multispecies resource management shows a strong hierarchy in both social actions and targets. Since sustainable development is an on-going, dynamic process, policy implementation and funding must also be continuous. Sustainable development therefore challenges the institutional sets for the process and its relations to local, regional and national policies.     

Mapping the global value and distribution of coral reef tourism

Global coral reef related tourism is one of the most significant examples of nature-based tourism from a single ecosystem. Coral reefs attract foreign and domestic visitors and generate revenues, including foreign exchange earnings, in over 100 countries and territories. Understanding the full value of coral reefs to tourism, and the spatial distribution of these values, provides an important incentive for sustainable reef management. In the current work, global data from multiple sources, including social media and crowd-sourced datasets, were used to estimate and map two distinct components of reef value. The first component is local “reef-adjacent” value, an overarching term used to capture a range of indirect benefits from coral reefs, including provision of sandy beaches, sheltered water, food, and attractive views. The second component is “on-reef” value, directly associated with in-water activities such diving and snorkelling. Tourism values were estimated as a proportion of the total visits and spending by coastal tourists within 30 km of reefs (excluding urban areas). Reef-adjacent values were set as a fixed proportion of 10% of this expenditure. On-reef values were based on the relative abundance of dive-shops and underwater photos in different countries and territories. Maps of value assigned to specific coral reef locations show considerable spatial variability across distances of just a few kilometres. Some 30% of the world's reefs are of value in the tourism sector, with a total value estimated at nearly US$36 billion, or over 9% of all coastal tourism value in the world's coral reef countries.     

我国东部沿海三大经济区区域经济的空间自相关分析

本文以我国东部沿海三大经济区域——环渤海、长三角、珠三角为研究对象,依据空间统计学的空间自相关方法,采用以高速公路里程数为影响因子改进的空间权重矩阵,以及全局和局部Moran I指数模型,通过ArcToolbox空间分析工具分析三大区域经济空间格局。研究结果表明,长三角与珠三角区域发展呈显著的空间正相关,长三角地区较之其他两地区发展最为成熟,发展极辐射大。同时地理环境对于区域经济发展作用明显,发展核心城市集中于沿江地区或平原地区。     

富华里中心地下室结构设计研究

富华里中心地下室塔楼外部分楼板和基础底板采用了无梁平板式结构方案。本文对该方案的经济性和设计中的计算分析方法做了简要分析。     

Diamond economics of the Prairie Creek lamproite, Murfreesboro, AR, USA

The Prairie Creek lamproite is the largest of seven ultramafic vents that make up the Prairie Creek lamproite province. Diamonds were first discovered in 1906, and commercial mining continued intermittently until about 1931. The evaluation program undertaken by the Arkansas State Parks Commission in the 1990s resulted in the mapping and evaluation of four major vent facies rock types: olivine lamproite, epiclastic sediments, phlogopite-rich tuff and olivine-rich tuff. Significant diamond contents were found only within the phlogopite-rich tuff (0.11 carat/100 tonnes) and olivine-rich tuff (1.1 carats/100 tonnes).Stratigraphic relationships indicate that the diamondiferous tuffs have undergone <50 m of erosion. Extrapolation of the surface rock units and their diamond contents to the pre-erosion surface suggests that 93,000 carats of diamonds were liberated and then concentrated as a natural surface enrichment. Early commercial production focused on the natural surface concentrations, an assumption supported by historic mining records. Historical grades suggest that 58,000 carats were contained in these surface deposits, about half of those diamonds being recovered during commercial operation. These relationships suggest that 35,000 carats remain as eluvial and alluvial deposits adjacent to the existing tourist area. This erosion model minimizes the prospects for either primary or alluvial commercial mining; however, it does validate early historic mining records and suggests areas for further tourist development within existing park boundaries.