Water Use Estimation and Forecasting for the Kentucky River Basin: A Preliminary Draft Report

We estimate aggregate monthly water use for summer, peak demand and nonsummer off-peak demand periods for the Kentucky River Basin. Using Kentucky Division of Water use data, U.S. Census data for county demographic and economic conditions, and U.S. Weather Service data for weather conditions we estimate use for the 1970-1993 period. Our model allows for idiosyncratic effects of each of the 27 counties in the sample. We find factors such as population and manufacturing employment effect use and temperature and rainfall in current and preceding months effect use during the summer, peak period. The model predicts well within the sample period Population forecasts. both moderate and high growth series, from the Kentucky Data Center are used along with the manufacturing employment forecasts for water use forecasts. Water use forecasts are made for years out to 2020 under 1930 drought conditions for comparison with water supply estimates. The use estimates are made assuming pricing and other demand management policies remain constant

Dynamic Optimal Management of Wind-Erosive Rangelands

A bioeconomic model of livestock production from wind-erosive rangelands is developed and optimized. Equations of motion capture the impact of topsoil stock on forage productivity and the protective effect of forage stock on soil loss from wind erosion. For overgrazed wind-erosive rangelands, a lower discount rate provides incentives for lighter grazing, as does consideration of effect of stocking rates on animal performance. In the case where off-site damages are large, internalizing off-site effects would also encourage lighter grazing and hence promote sustainable production. An illustrative application of the model is also included. Copyright 1997, Oxford University Press.

Statistical Approaches to the Fat Tail Problem for Dichotomous Choice Contingent Valuation

If a cumulative density function estimated from dichotomous choice data has an unrealistically fat right-hand tail, mean willingness to pay (WTP) will be overestimated. Truncating the range of integration results in a lower-bound estimate of the true mean WTP. A normalization procedure proposed by Boyle, Welsh, and Bishop (1988) unnecessarily depresses the estimate further. A new statistical approach is presented that allows a best-guess estimate of mean WTP. Because this estimate involves extrapolation beyond the range of the data, it tends to be highly variable.

A Structural County-Level Model of Human Capital Investment and Manufacturing Sector Change: 1980-90

The objective of this paper is to empirically examine the relationship between changes in per capita manufacturing employment, manufacturing earnings per worker and human capital investment in nearly 3,000 U.S. counties over the period 1980-90. Two key hypotheses are tested: 1. Communities in which residents invested more heavily in human capital (formal education) in the 1980s were in a better position to stem the erosion of manufacturing jobs, and experienced more rapid increases in manufacturing earnings per worker. 2.Communities in which manufacturing jobs and earnings per worker both increased invested more heavily in human capital, ceteris paribus

An economic analysis of wind erosion control in the inner Mongolia Plateau, China

This study investigates specific changes in farming practices aimed at reducing wind erosion from cropland in the inner Mongolia Plateau, China, and incorporates the value of dust reduction in downwind regions into a formal cost-benefit framework, both from the farmer's perspective and society's perspective. The result shows the need for incorporating off-site damages from wind erosion in policy analyses. Measurement of the off-site damages is difficult, especially in a mixed economy such as China's. A conservative estimate was obtained by benefit transfer from a non-market valuation study conducted in a developed country. This conservative estimate was large enough to be decisive in the policy analysis. Copyright Kluwer Academic Publishers 1995Cost-benefit analysis, wind erosion, soil conservation, off-site damages, benefit transfer,

Autocalibration of an Electronic Compass for Augmented Reality

Electronic compass is often used to provide the absolute heading reference for tracking the user’s head and hands in Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR), especially for outdoor AR applications. However, compass is vulnerable to environment magnetism disturbance. Existing compass calibration methods require complex steps and true heading reference which is often impossible to be obtained in outdoor AR applications, and is useful only when compass is in horizontal plane. An autocalibration method without the need of heading reference and redundant sensors is proposed in this paper. First the compass error model based on physical principle is presented, then the algorithm to calculate the compensation coefficients with a set of sample measurements of the sensors in the compass is described. Because the influence of the environmental disturbance has been effectively compensated, the calibrated compass can provided accurate heading even when it is under large tilt attitude. 1. Introduction and Relate

Differences between Continuous and Discrete Contingent Value Estimates

In a split-sample contingent valuation study of willingness to pay (WTP) for food safety improvements, the dichotomous choice (DC) elicitation method consistently generated much larger estimates of WTP than did a continuous method. Little or none of these differences was due to bias introduced by the statistical techniques used with the DC data. Most or all of the difference was due to differences in respondent behavior. In addition, the continuous WTP responses showed a significant scope effect, while the DC responses did not. The observed difference in behavior may be attributable in part to yea-saying by DC respondents.