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USING EMERGY TO QUANTIFY AN ECONOMIC HIERACHY BETWEEN FOUR U.S. STATES-MARYLAND, DELAWARE, NEW JERSEY, AND PENNSYLVANIA
Citation:
BrandtWilliams, S, E. Felix, AND D. Riposo. USING EMERGY TO QUANTIFY AN ECONOMIC HIERACHY BETWEEN FOUR U.S. STATES-MARYLAND, DELAWARE, NEW JERSEY, AND PENNSYLVANIA. Presented at U of Florida 3rd Biennial Emergy Conference, Gainsville, FL, January 29-31, 2004.
Description:
Using emergy to quantify an economic hierarchy between four U.S. states - Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania
A regional emergy evaluation was completed for each of four adjacent states with differing levels and sources of economic productivity ? Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. States are sometimes classified according to the materials and energy exchanged between the state and the nation as a whole, anecdotally referred to as producers/value-added/user states or alternatively as exploited or exploiting states. A state whose exchanges are dominated by mining and export of materials or goods might be considered a producer state, while a high level of imports might indicate a user state. A value-added state would convert raw materials into more finished products. Using this perspective, Pennsylvania is sometimes considered to be a producer state, New Jersey a value added state, and both Maryland and Delaware might be considered user states. Emergy indices calculated as part of each state?s evaluation were used to quantitatively rank these states and to directly compare the real wealth inherent in their imports and exports, as well as the renewable and nonrenewable energy that serve as the foundation for their economy. Preliminary results indicate that the comparison is much more complex and that several different emergy/economic hierarchies might be represented. For example, from an overall economic perspective, Maryland and Delaware were operating at a slight surplus (imports greater than exports) while New Jersey and Pennsylvania operated at a slight deficit. However, from an emergetic view, Delaware and Pennsylvania are retaining much more real wealth than either Maryland or New Jersey.