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Title: Best Management Practices and Nutrient Reduction: An Integrated Economic-Hydrologic Model of the Western Lake Erie Basin
We develop the first spatially integrated economic-hydrological model of the western Lake Erie basin explicitly linking economic models of farmers' field-level Best Management Practice (BMP) adoption choices with the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model to evaluate nutrient management policy cost-effectiveness. We quantify tradeoffs among phosphorus reduction policies and find that a hybrid policy coupling a fertilizer tax with cost-share payments for subsurface placement is the most cost-effective, and when implemented with a 200% tax can achieve the stated policy goal of 40% reduction in nutrient loadings. We also find economic adoption models alone can overstate the potential for BMPs to reduce nutrient loadings by ignoring biophysical complexities. Key Words: Integrated assessment model; agricultural land watershed model; water quality; cost-share; conservation practice; nutrient management JEL Codes: H23, Q51, Q52, Q53  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1739909
NSF-PAR ID:
10188863
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ; ; ;
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Land economics
Volume:
96
Issue:
4
ISSN:
1543-8325
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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