Bipasa Datta

Biodiesel as feasible petrol fuel replacement: a multidisciplinary overview

Biodiesel is a sustainable, non-toxic, biodegradable diesel fuel substitute that can be employed in current diesel car infrastructure without major modifications in the engines. It has a significant added value compared to petroleum-based diesel, reflected in a series of improved properties including fewer carcinogenic particulate matter emissions, increased lubricity and biodegradability as well as ease of handling, transport and storage. Nevertheless, it is essential that the biodiesel life-cycle is environmentally sustainable, economically viable, and socially acceptable; views that can only be properly analysed by means of a multi-angle approach. In this contribution, we aim to provide a multidisciplinary perspective on key issues for the successful implementation of biodiesel as a petrol fuel replacement including green chemistry methods to improve production and quality, the use of energy crops and feedstocks for second-generation biodiesel as well as socio-economic studies and the importance of governmental regulatory issues.

Technological Change, Entry, and Stock-Market Dynamics: An Analysis of Transition in a Monopolistic Industry

This paper explores an equilibrium model for industry entry dynamics and technological change. We focus on the share valuation of firms in the transition as technology changes, and whether or not share prices are always increasing when technology improves. We find that there can be a U-shaped transition dynamic, so that an initial boom in share price is followed by a temporary fall in share price even though the underlying technology is improving.

Linear-homothetic preferences

This paper develops a new class of linear homothetic (LH) preferences that result in Marshallian demands that are linear in price under the assumption that agents take aggregate price indeces as given (as in monopolistic competition). The preferences are represented by a cost-function that has one parameter, which can be interpreted as the elasticity of demand when all prices are equal. The cost-function has a restricted form that allows the elasticity of demand to be compatible with any number of commodities.

Free Internet Access and Regulation: A Note

We consider the effect of the regulation of telephony on HAANs [2001] analysis of the economics of free Internet access. Haan considers an unregulated market, and finds that free Internet access is compatible with an efficient outcome and avoids the double marginalization problem. We find that if there is binding price-cap regulation, then free Internet access is never efficient: ISP access charges will be strictly positive. This suggests that either price-cap regulation is nonbinding in the ISP access market, or some other explanation is required.

omega-Homothetic Preferences: Theory and Applications

This paper develops a new class of homothetic preferences which generate Marshallian demand curves for individual goods which can be concave, convex or linear in own price under the assumption that agents treat aggregate price indices as given (as in Dixit-Stiglitz, 1977). The preferences are represented by a cost function which has two parameters: one determining the curvature of the Marshallian demand; the other determining the elasticity of demand when all prices are equal. The elasticity of demand varies with relative prices. Illustrative examples are given of Cournot duopoly and exchange rate pass-through.