Social Cost of Carbon: What Do the Numbers Really Mean?

Social cost of carbon (SCC) is estimated by integrated assessment models (IAM) and is widely used by government agencies to value climate policy impacts. While there is an ongoing debate about obtained numerical estimates and related uncertainties, little attention has been paid so far to the SCC calculation method itself. This work attempts to fill the gap by providing theoretical background and economic interpretation of the SCC calculation approach implemented in the open-source IAM DICE (Dynamic Integrated model of Climate and the Economy). Our analysis indicates that the present calculation method provides an approximation that might work pretty well in some cases, while in the other cases the estimated value substantially (by the factor of four) deviates from the "true" value. This deviation stems from the inability of the present calculation method to catch the linkages between two key IAM's components -- complex interconnected systems -- climate and economy, both influenced by emission abatement policies. Within the modeling framework of DICE, the presently estimated SCC valuates policy-uncontrolled emissions against economically unjustified consumption, which makes it irrelevant for application in climate-economic policies and, therefore, calls for a replacement by a more appropriate indicator. An apparent SCC alternative, which can be employed for policy formulation is the direct output of the DICE model -- the socially optimal marginal abatement cost (SMAC), which corresponds to technological possibilities at optimal level of carbon emissions abatement. In policy making, because of the previously employed implicit approximation, great attention needs to be paid to the use of SCC estimates obtained earlier

Service-Based Socio-Cyberphysical Network Modeling for Guided Self-Organization

AbstractSocio-cyberphysical networks tightly integrate humans, real-world objects and IT infrastructure. In some cases of cyberphysical networks, their configuration can be done in a centralized way (e.g., automated production line configuration). However, for socio-cyberphysical networks the centralized control is not possible due to the independence and autonomy of the network members (e.g., employees of an enterprise). The paper proposes an approach to model such network via a set of interacting socio-inspired services. Such services are capable to model behavior of the network participants taking into account their preferences, strategies and social norms. The interoperability of the services is achieved due to the usage of common standards (such as WSDL and SOAP) at the technological level, and common ontology at the semantic level. The developed conceptual model of socio-inspired service is presented together with behavior patterns and methods for their processing

Competence–Based Support of Interaction between Business Network Members

In a complicated business network finding a supplier can be a very time consuming task. The technology of competence management is aimed to support such kind of tasks. The paper presents an approach to support interaction between business network members based on such technologies as competence management and knowledge management. The conceptual models of the context-driven competence management system and production network member competence profile are described. The usage of the competence management system is illustrated via an example from automotive industry

Shadow prices and optimal cost in economic applications

Shadow prices are well understood and are widely used in economic applications. However, there are limits to where shadow prices can be applied assuming their natural interpretation and the fact that they reflect the first order optimality conditions (FOC). In this paper, we present a simple ad-hoc example demonstrating that marginal cost associated with exercising an optimal control may exceed the respective cost estimated from a ratio of shadow prices. Moreover, such cost estimation through shadow prices is arbitrary and depends on a particular (mathematically equivalent) formulation of the optimization problem. These facts render a ratio of shadow prices irrelevant to estimation of optimal marginal cost. The provided illustrative optimization problem links to a similar approach of calculating social cost of carbon (SCC) in the widely used dynamic integrated model of climate and the economy (DICE)

Mathematical and physical modeling of heat transfer through window with heat-reflecting screens to determine the potential of reducing thermal costs for microclimate parameters maintaining

A mathematical model describing the process of heat transfer through windows with heat-reflecting screens, taking into account physical and geometrical parameters of the building construction, was developed. The computer program for the calculation of heat transfer through the window has been developed and results of numerical heat transfer simulation for different parameters of indoor and outdoor air are given. Expressions to determine the thermal resistance for the specific types of glazing with a heat-reflecting screens installed outside were derived on the basis of the developed method. The adequacy of the suggested mathematical model was confirmed by experimental data

Modern pollen data from pristine taiga forest of Pechora-Ilych state nature biosphere reserve (Komi republic, Russia): first results

The first results of modern pollen investigations from western slop of Ural Mountains presented. 33 modern pollen samples have been collected in June 2016 from four dominant forest types (Sphagnum, true moss, tall fern and tall herbs sections) in Pechora-Ilych state nature biosphere reserve (Komi republic, Russia). The detail record of surrounding vegetation was performed at every sampling point. Pollen assemblages are mostly dominated by tree pollen (Betula type, Pinus haploxylon type and Picea). The pollen assemblages and vegetation records will be statistically analyzed (clustering and correspondence analysis) to investigate how vegetation is reflected in pollen assemblages and for producing new series of PPEs

TYPES AND SPECIFICS OF CONSTRUCTION MACHINES USED IN ROAD PAVEMENT DISMANTLING

Road construction is a number of activities including engineering, actual construction of road pavements, as well as maintenance and repair of roads of various purposes. An important area in intensification and acceleration of scientific progress in road construction is a wide use of construction and road machines. Road machines are designed to mechanize road construction works. Maximum road construction mechanization is reached by using special road equipment including dozens of machine types. Use of special equipment reduces the share of manual labor (used only for patch work) and prime cost of road construction. The article discusses types of road construction machines most frequently used in dismantling of road pavements (road grader, excavator, loader, tractor, bulldozer and recycler), their purpose and specifics

A Regime-Switching Recurrent Neural Network Model Applied to Wind Time Series

This paper proposes a regime-switching recurrent network model (RS-RNN) for non-stationary time series. The RS-RNN model emits a mixture density with dynamic nonlinear regimes that fit flexibly data distributions with non-Gaussian shapes. The key novelties are: development of an original representation of the means of the component distributions by dynamic nonlinear recurrent networks, and derivation of a corresponding expectation maximization (EM) training algorithm for finding the model parameters. The elaborated switching dynamic nonlinear regimes make the RS-RNN especially attractive for describing non-stationary environmental time series. The results show that the RS-RNN applied to a real-world wind speed time series achieves standardized residuals similar to popular previous models, but it is more accurate distribution forecasting than other linear switching (MS-AR) and nonlinear neural network (MLP and RNN) models

Cоздание и развитие логистических систем информационной поддержки принятия решений на этапе послепродажного сервисного обслуживания

In this article we discuss about the problematic aspects of constructing logistics systems for decision support information systems used at the stage of after-sales servicing of aircraft, based on an analysis of the modern organization of their design, principles of a systematic approach and fuzzy logic.El presente artículo analiza los problemas derivados del desarrollo de procedimientos logísticos para sistemas de información de apoyo a la toma de decisiones utilizados en la etapa de servicio posventa de aeronaves, basado en la lógica difusa, en un análisis de una organización moderna de diseño y en unos principios de enfoque sistemático.В статье рассматриваются проблемные аспекты построения логистических систем информационного обеспечения принятия решений, используемых на этапе послепродажного обслуживания самолетов, на основе анализа современной организации их конструкции, принципы системного подхода и нечеткая логика