You are here:
INTEGRATION OF AN ECONOMY UNDER IMPERFECT COMPETITION WITH A TWELVE-CELL ECOLOGICAL MODEL
Citation:
WHITMORE, JR., H. W., C. PAWLOWSKI, H. CABEZAS, A. L. MAYER, AND T. HOAGLAND. INTEGRATION OF AN ECONOMY UNDER IMPERFECT COMPETITION WITH A TWELVE-CELL ECOLOGICAL MODEL. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, D.C., EPA/600/R-06/046, 2006.
Impact/Purpose:
To inform the public.
Description:
This report documents the scientific research work done to date on developing a generalized mathematical model depicting a combined economic-ecological-social system with the goal of making it available to the scientific community. The model is preliminary and has not been tested or fully explored. The model system described here is intended to represent the first steps in combining (in simple fashion) the basic dynamic elements of an ecosystem functioning with a human society and an economy in a closed system with a non-limiting supply of energy (the model is based on flows of mass between system compartments while the total mass is conserved). In this preliminary model, optimizing economic agents (firms and households) interact in specific markets and with an ecological system consisting of resource pools and several domesticated and wild species. The result is an interdependent system that attempts to model macroeconomic variables (based on underlying property rights) and environmental stocks and flows. The report contains four chapters. Chapter 1 introduces the project's objective and approach; provides a background on sustainability as a complex system composed of several dimensions interacting through time; and provides a brief overview of the integrated economic/ecological model and its development. Chapter 2 gives a detailed description of the integrated model as it currently exists with equations and explanations. Chapter 3 provides the model solution and operational equations. Chapter 4 provides a summary of the report. The appendices contain a glossery of terms and the computer code used to implement the model in a form suitable for simulating different scenarions. A portion of this report was submitted in partial fulfillment of Simplified Acquisition Order Number 4C-R101-NASA by H. W. Whitmore, under the sponsorship of the United States Environmental Protection Agency. This report covers a period from March 3, 2004 to August 15, 2005. The work was completed as of February 28, 2006.