Adam Daigneault

Economic Approach to Assess the Forest Carbon Implications of Biomass Energy

There is widespread concern that biomass energy policy that promotes forests as a supply source will cause net carbon emissions. Most of the analyses that have been done to date, however, are biological, ignoring the effects of market adaptations through substitution, net imports, and timber investments. This paper uses a dynamic model of forest and land use management to estimate the impact of United States energy policies that emphasize the utilization of forest biomass on global timber production and carbon stocks over the next 50 years. We show that when market factors are included in the analysis, expanded demand for biomass energy increases timber prices and harvests, but reduces net global carbon emissions because higher wood prices lead to new investments in forest stocks. Estimates are sensitive to assumptions about whether harvest residues and new forestland can be used for biomass energy and the demand for biomass. Restricting biomass energy to being sourced only from roundwood on existing forestland can transform the policy from a net sink to a net source of emissions. These results illustrate the importance of capturing market adjustments and a large geographic scope when measuring the carbon implications of biomass energy policies.

Optimal Forest Management with Carbon Sequestration Credits and Endogenous Fire Risk

We use a stochastic dynamic profit maximization model to investigate the effects of forest carbon sequestration credits on optimal forest management practices for stands facing wildfire risk. Landowners that periodically thin a stand can increase growth rates and mitigate loss of timber and carbon stocks from wildfire. Results indicate that thinning and shortening rotations are cost-effective strategies to mitigate wildfire risk. Carbon prices cause landowners to delay both their thinning treatments and the final rotation age. Thinning and extending timber rotations are thus a viable climate-change mitigation option even when stands are susceptible to risks of fire. (JEL Q23, Q54)

Estimating Impacts of Climate Change Policy on Land Use: An Agent-Based Modelling Approach

Agriculture is important to New Zealand’s economy. Like other primary producers, New Zealand strives to increase agricultural output while maintaining environmental integrity. Utilising modelling to explore the economic, environmental and land use impacts of policy is critical to understand the likely effects on the sector. Key deficiencies within existing land use and land cover change models are the lack of heterogeneity in farmers and their behaviour, the role that social networks play in information transfer, and the abstraction of the global and regional economic aspects within local-scale approaches. To resolve these issues we developed the Agent-based Rural Land Use New Zealand model. The model utilises a partial equilibrium economic model and an agent-based decision-making framework to explore how the cumulative effects of individual farmer’s decisions affect farm conversion and the resulting land use at a catchment scale. The model is intended to assist in the development of policy to shape agricultural land use intensification in New Zealand. We illustrate the model, by modelling the impact of a greenhouse gas price on farm-level land use, net revenue, and environmental indicators such as nutrient losses and soil erosion for key enterprises in the Hurunui and Waiau catchments of North Canterbury in New Zealand. Key results from the model show that farm net revenue is estimated to increase over time regardless of the greenhouse gas price. Net greenhouse gas emissions are estimated to decline over time, even under a no GHG price baseline, due to an expansion of forestry on low productivity land. Higher GHG prices provide a greater net reduction of emissions. While social and geographic network effects have minimal impact on net revenue and environmental outputs for the catchment, they do have an effect on the spatial arrangement of land use and in particular the clustering of enterprises.

The Paris Agreement and its impact on cattle and food sectors of New Zealand

ABSTRACT The Paris Agreement asserts that greenhouse gas emission pathways should be consistent with holding the increase in global temperature below 1.5 °C, or 2 °C above pre-industrial levels. The purpose of this paper is to assess the economic impact of this agreement on the cattle and food product sectors of New Zealand. We used a general equilibrium approach to evaluate the economic impacts, and the Global Timber Model to estimate forestry carbon sequestration. We simulated eight scenarios where we allow accounting/not accounting for sequestration, pricing/not pricing agricultural emissions, and linking/not linking the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) with the European Union ETS. We found that significant negative impacts occur if sequestration is not accounted, the ETS remains unlinked and agriculture is priced. Competitiveness, in turn, is not significantly affected if sequestration is accounted, regardless of the linking scheme of the ETS.

A Response to Doole and Marsh ([Doole, G., 2013]) Article: Methodological Limitations in the Evaluation of Policies to Reduce Nitrate Leaching from New Zealand Agriculture

A recent paper by Doole and Marsh (2013), questioned the validity of using the New Zealand Forest and Agriculture Regional Model (NZFARM) for New Zealand agri‐environmental policy analysis. We respond to their critique by clearly describing the model structure, explaining the NZFARM parameterisation, calibration, and validation procedure, and presenting estimates from a series of nutrient reduction policy scenarios to highlight the utility of the model. In doing so, we demonstrate that NZFARM generates logical and intuitive results that can be used for robust agri‐environmental policy decision‐making.

Does community resilience mitigate loss and damage from climaterelated disasters? Evidence based on survey data

Abstract Policy-makers view community resilience as fundamental to mitigating loss and damage from climate-related disasters. Although energy has been devoted to defining resilience, less effort has been devoted to analysing the effects of resilience on loss and damage, which is critical in places with limited capacity for adaptation. We use survey data to develop a composite index of community resilience in Fiji and then evaluate the extent to which community resilience mitigates loss and damage. We find that community resilience is negatively correlated with damages over which human intervention may be effective, but not with damages over which intervention is less effective, suggesting that community resilience may limit impacts. We further find that this result holds for a cyclone (about which communities had substantial advance warning) but not for river flooding (for which communities had little advanced warning), suggesting that early warning is necessary for community resilience to become responsive.

Climate change and the economic impacts of flooding on Fiji

This paper quantifies the economic impacts of flooding in the Ba River and Penang River catchments in Viti Levu, Fiji. We conducted a detailed assessment of flood damage stemming from two major flooding events in 2012 that severely affected the two important catchments, primarily by using evidence from a novel survey administered in early 2013. We combine these empirical measures of damage with GIS data to estimate total damages from flooding and find that the January 2012 flood caused FJ

Managing the Invasive Small Indian Mongoose in Fiji

36.4 and FJ

Age, values, farming objectives, past management decisions, and future intentions in New Zealand agriculture

12.2 in damages for the Ba River and Penang River catchments, respectively, while the March 2012 flood caused FJ

Dredging versus hedging: Comparing hard infrastructure to ecosystem-based adaptation to flooding

24.1 and FJ