Progress 11/10/14 to 08/28/18
Outputs
Target Audience:Stakeholders who will benefit from W3190's research and outreach include: agricultural producers and consumers, irrigation and conservation districts, private water-supply organizations, states. Changes/Problems:N/A, Project Director is no longer at Utah State University. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Objective 1: Masters student Kyle Eager successfully defended his thesis "Measuring the Adaptive Response to Drought," which examined the availability of aquifer water in drought adaptation and resiliency on agricultural land in Kansas. (2016) Masters student Kyle Eager presented his work on drought and crop choice in western Kansas at the Applied Economics Department Graduate Student Showcase where he gained experience and received feedback to help develop his presentation skills. Objective 2: (2016-18) Funded grant: Native Waters on Arid Lands for which Dr. Edwards is Co-PI offers training activities for graduate students in areas related to the project. Objective 3: (2017) I advised and mentored 13 undergraduate researchers on the potential for water markets to address the decline of the Great Salt Lake. The students learned how to conduct academic research and write publishable academic papers, and developed expertise in water resource economics. (2016-18) Participated in three W3190 meetings (Salt Lake City, UT; Lincoln, NE; Portland, OR) each of which had a component focused on professional development. (2016) I advised and mentored nine undergraduate researchers working on "Unlocking Utah's Water Potential through Conservation." The students learned how to conduct academic research and write publishable academic papers, and developed expertise in water resource economics. Of the four undergraduate researchers that have graduated so far, this work provided experience and career guidance for two now employed in the water field and one in an economics master's program. (2015-17) PhD student Muyang Ge and myself attended the Native Waters on Arid Lands Tribal summit in Las Vegas, NV (2015 and 2016) and Reno, NV (2017) and the 2016 Tribal Water Summit in Fort Hall, ID where we learned more about issues affecting research on how land ownership affects water choices and economic outcomes. (2018) PhD student Muyang Ge presented her work on property rights and their effect on water management on American Indian Reservations in the USU Applied Economics seminar. (2016-18) PhD student Muyang Ge participated in the Climate Adaptation Science NSF traineeship program at Utah State including an internship and studio class where she learned to apply climate science research to her research area in water management. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Academic publications relevant to work on objectives 1-3: Edwards, E.C., Bosworth, R.C., Adams, P., Baji, V., Burrows, A., Gerdes, C., Jones, M. 2017. Economic Insight from Utah's Water Efficiency Supply Curve. Water, 9, 214. Edwards, E.C. 2016. What Lies Beneath? Aquifer Heterogeneity and the Economics of Groundwater Management. Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 3 no. 2, pp. 453-91. Edwards, E.C. and Smith, S.M. The Role of Irrigation in the Development of Agriculture in the United States. Accepted at Journal of Economic History. Ge, M., Edwards, E.C. and Akhundjanov, S.B. Land Ownership and Irrigation on American Indian Reservations. Submitted for Publication. Edwards, E.C. and Null, S.E. The Cost of Addressing Saline Lake Decline and the Potential for Markets. Submitted for Publication Presentations relevant to work on objectives 1-3: SIOE Annual Conference. 2017. Society for Institutional & Organizational Economics. New York, NY. "Transaction Costs Constraints on Collective Action for Common-pool Resources: The Case of California's Groundwater." iUTAH Annual Symposium & Summer All-Hands Meeting. 2017. iUTAH. Logan, UT. "The potential for markets to preserve water supply to the Great Salt Lake." The Challenge of Balancing Competing Demands for Water. 2017. Property and Environment Research Center. Maui, HI. "Pathways to Improving Water Management." Food and Resource Economics Department Seminar. 2017. University of Florida. Gainseville, FL. "The Role of Irrigation in the Development of American Agriculture." Western Economics Association International Annual Meeting. 2016. Honolulu, HI. Association of Environmental and Resource Economics Session. "Remedies for the Common Pool: The Case of California's Groundwater Management." Department Seminar. 2016. Plants Soils and Climate Department. Utah State University. "Illiquid Markets: Water Rights and Efficiency in the Western United States." Earth Sciences Department Seminar. 2015. Montana State University. Bozeman, MT. "What lies beneath? Aquifer heterogeneity and the economics of collective action." Society for Institutional & Organizational Economics Annual Conference. 2015. Boston, MA. "What lies beneath? Aquifer heterogeneity and the economics of collective action." Energy, the Environment, and Regulatory Policy. 2015. Strata. Logan, Utah. "Water Markets and the Law of One Price." Economics Department Seminar. 2015. Weber State University. Ogden, UT. "Water Markets and the Law of One Price." (2016) Work on objective 2 was presented by undergraduate students in a poster session at Utah State and orally to the faculty in Utah State's Center for Water Efficient Landscaping. An academic paper "Insight from Utah's Water Efficiency Supply Curve," was submitted and is under revision at the journal Water. (2017) Work on objective 2 was presented in a poster session at the Utah State Spring Runoff session by undergraduate students: Economic Insight from Utah's Water Efficiency Supply Curve. Work was also presented at the iUTAH Annual Symposium & Summer All-Hands Meeting on July 13 -14, at Utah State University in Logan. I presented "The potential for markets to preserve water supply to the Great Salt Lake" while undergraduate researchers presented "Economic insights from Utah's water efficiency supply curve." Audiences at both events were a mix of academics, government, and water agency officials and employees. I presented work on property rights and their effect on water management on American Indian Reservations at the Native Waters on Arid Lands Tribal summit in Reno, NV; the audience was primarily non-academic consisting of tribal agricultural producers, water managers, and government and extension professionals. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?N/A, Project Director is no longer at Utah State University.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Objective 1. Characterize bio-physical and economic factors (and interactions) that influence water-use decisions and related market or non-market outcomes. (2015) Analysis of individual agricultural parcel data in Kansas occurred after the completion of a large data set linking land sales, crop choice, and aquifer characteristics. Preliminary analysis indicates that crop rotation is affected by aquifer access and drought. Land value through time is shown to be related to water access, and more importantly, to differences in the characteristics of the aquifer, for instance saturated thickness. (2015-18) Statistical analysis of 430 groundwater basins in California indicates that basins select institutions to address overdraft based on the potential benefits: basins with high-value water and large common pool problems (high hydraulic conductivity) are more likely to adopt more stringent management controls. Basins with significant, and costly, overdraft are found to have characteristics indicative of high bargaining costs that may limit their ability to adopt stringent management: heterogeneous users (ag and urban), large basin size, and large numbers of pumping wells. Objective 2. Develop or enhance methods to address emerging water management issues. (2016) Conducted preliminary analysis of groundwater management in California to assess potential methods for implementing the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA). Results indicate that basins select management that balances costs and benefits. Basins with large potential groundwater issues such as saltwater intrusion, high population growth, or high hydraulic conductivity select more expensive, and restrictive, management institutions for groundwater relative to other basins. (2016-17) Study of outcome of water allocation institutions throughout the state of Utah suggests that an additional 1.7 million acre-feet of water is available via water conservation. The largest potential water savings, at the lowest cost, are in agriculture and outdoor residential water use, where more efficient application can maintain acreage of crops and lawns at current levels while dramatically reducing use. (2016-18) we examined agricultural land use and irrigation on parcels on and adjacent to the Uintah-Ouray Indian Reservation in eastern Utah. Land within the reservation is held in trust by the federal government and has significant restrictions on its use and development. We predict that this land will see lower investment in irrigation and therefore lower agricultural productivity. We use the exogenous allocation boundaries of a 1905 land allotment as a natural experiment, employing both a sharp and a fuzzy regression discontinuity (RD) design to explore how land ownership has affected agricultural land use, irrigation levels, and irrigation investment. Our results suggest that the original allocations provided land of similar quality across the border. Despite this, tribal lands are around 18 percentage points less likely to be irrigated today, and conditional on being irrigated, tribal land has a 31 percentage point lower rate of capital intensive sprinkler irrigation. Tribal land is also less likely to grow high-value crops. These results suggest that trust ownership creates significant barriers to the acquisition of capital for agricultural investment, and helps explain lagging agricultural development on reservations. Objective 3. Evaluate and compare alternative water policy and management institutions. (2016) Completed dataset linking parcel level data from 23 counties overlying High Plains Aquifer in western Kansas to land sale price (1985-2009) aquifer properties, and crop choice (2007-2012). Statistical analysis of groundwater management in western Kansas indicates that benefits of management accrue to landowners overlying more "shared" areas, as well as those that receive less precipitation. A landowner in a county with hydraulic conductivity one standard deviation higher sees a relative land value increase of 5-8% when management is implemented. Counties with lower recharge also see relative increases in land value. Changes in farm size and percentage of cropland in corn are also consistent with the proposition that the effect of management is unequal and depends on properties of the physical system. (2016) Completed database linking agricultural census data (1900-1978) with physical characteristics of High Plains aquifer (all states). (2017-18) Human diversions from tributary streams to the Great Salt Lake (Utah, USA) have caused the lake level to decline during the last century. Recent work has suggested inflows would need to increase at least 25% to maintain a target elevation consistent with full-functioning ecosystems. We construct cost estimates of increasing water inflows using conservation opportunity cost curves for each river basin. We then compare the cost of uniform cutbacks to cap-and-trade systems which allow intra- and inter-basin trading. The cost of permanently implementing uniform water right cutbacks to increase inflows by 25% is $52.0 million. Costs and cost-savings are sensitive to alternative allocation, inflow, and cost assumptions, and we estimate significant cost reductions from intra-basin water conservation markets (2-50% cost decrease) and inter-basin water conservation markets (23-54% cost decrease). The costs of proactively addressing saline lake depletion are small relative to mitigation efforts post-desiccation. For comparison, the city of Los Angeles, which historically diverted water from terminal Owens Lake, will spend $3.6 billion over 25 years to reduce airborne dust.
Publications
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Progress 10/01/16 to 09/30/17
Outputs
Target Audience:Stakeholders who will benefit from W3190's research and outreach include: agricultural producers and consumers, irrigation and conservation districts, private water-supply organizations, states. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?I advised and mentored 13 undergraduate researchers working from January through May of 2017 on work related to objective 2 exploring the potential for water markets to address the decline of the Great Salt Lake. The students learned how to conduct academic research and write publishable academic papers, and developed expertise in water resource economics. PhD student Muyang Ge presented her work on property rights and their effect on water management on American Indian Reservations in the Applied Economics seminar. PhD student Muyang Ge and myself attended the Native Waters on Arid Lands Tribal summit in Reno, NV where we learned more about issues affecting research on how land ownership affects water choices and economic outcomes (objective 3). PhD student Muyang Ge participated in the Climate Adaptation Science NSF traineeship program at Utah State including an internship and studio class where she learned to apply climate science research to her research area in water management. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Work on objective 1 was presented to an academic audience at the Society for Institutional & Organizational Economics (SIOE) Annual Conference at Columbia University in New York City. Work on objective 2 was presented in a poster session at the Utah State Spring Runoff session by undergraduate students: Economic Insight from Utah's Water Efficiency Supply Curve. Work was also presented at the iUTAH Annual Symposium & Summer All-Hands Meeting on July 13 -14, at Utah State University in Logan. I presented "The potential for markets to preserve water supply to the Great Salt Lake" while undergraduate researchers presented "Economic insights from Utah's water efficiency supply curve." Audiences at both events were a mix of academics, government, and water agency officials and employees. I presented work on property rights and their effect on water management on American Indian Reservations at the Native Waters on Arid Lands Tribal summit in Reno, NV; the audience was primarily non-academic consisting of tribal agricultural producers, water managers, and government and extension professionals. Publication for work on objective 2: Edwards, E.C., Bosworth, R.C., Adams, P., Baji, V., Burrows, A., Gerdes, C., Jones, M. 2017. Economic Insight from Utah's Water Efficiency Supply Curve. Water, 9, 214. Work on objective 3 was presented as the keynote address at an educational forum in Maui, Hawaii, attended primarily by academic researchers and students entitled "The Challenge of Balancing Competing Demands for Water." What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?Objective 1: Publication of: Ayres, A.B., Edwards, E.C. and Libecap, G.D. Do Transaction Costs Obstruct Collective Action to Limit Common-pool Losses? Evidence from California's Groundwater. NBER Working Paper No. 23382. Revision requested at Journal of Environmental Economics and Management. Extension fact sheet on urban water pricing in Utah; ongoing project with cities of West Jordan, South Jordan, and Riverton. Submission of grant proposal to NSF Couple Natural-Human Systems: The Coupled Dynamics of Economic and Ecosystem Production in a Water-Scarce Basin Objectives 2/3: Continued dissemination of findings of "Insight from Utah's Water Efficiency Supply Curve" to Utah legislators, water districts, and academic audiences. Completion of an extension fact sheet. Publication of: Edwards, E.C., Libecap, G.D, Cristi, O. and Edwards, G. An Illiquid Market in the Desert: Estimating the Cost of Water Trade Restrictions in Northern Chile. (An earlier version appeared as NBER Working Paper No. 21869) Revision requested at Environment and Development Economics. Publication of: Edwards, E.C. and Smith, S.M. The Role of Irrigation in the Development of Agriculture in the United States. Revision requested at Journal of Economic History. Completion and submission of manuscript: "The Cost of Addressing Saline Lake Decline and the Potential for Markets." Completion and submission of manuscript: "Land Ownership and Irrigation on American Indian Reservations: A Regression Discontinuity Approach."
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Objective 1. Characterize bio-physical and economic factors (and interactions) that influence water-use decisions and related market or non-market outcomes. None. Objective 2. Develop or enhance methods to address emerging water management issues. American Indian Reservations offer an interesting case for which to study agricultural development because reservation land is governed under different institutional arrangements than adjacent land. We examine irrigation choices of parcels on and adjacent to the Uintah-Ouray Indian Reservation in eastern Utah to understand the quality of land allocated to the tribe (selection effect) and the impact of tribal governance (institution effect). Taken together, our results suggest that the original allocations provided better land to the tribe, around seven percentage points more likely to be irrigated; but tribal lands are around thirty percent less likely to be irrigated today. Conditional on land being irrigated, tribal land is also around 30% less likely to have more capital-intensive sprinkler irrigation systems. These results suggest that difficulties in securing capital for irrigation infrastructure and equipment may help explain lagging agricultural development on reservations. These results motivate ongoing work to understand what institutional remedies might improve the level and efficiency of irrigated agricultural on American Indian Reservations. Objective 3. Evaluate and compare alternative water policy and management institutions. Reducing water diversions to provide sufficient water to the Great Salt Lake to fully provide ecosystem services would cost around $90 million if the cutbacks were applied uniformly across basins. However, by allowing these cutbacks to be exchanged, costs are reduced by almost 40%. Further, the cost reductions persist if trading is limited only to other users within a basin. This work provides estimates of the cost of protecting ecosystems, as well as the monetary benefits, in terms of costs avoided, of allowing markets efficiently allocate the cutbacks.
Publications
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2017
Citation:
Edwards, E., Smith, S. (2017). The Role of Irrigation in the Development of American Agriculture. Journal of Economic History. works.bepress.com/eric_edwards/12/
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2017
Citation:
Edwards, E., Bosworth, R. C., Baji, V., Burrows, A., Gerdes, C., Adams, P., Jones, M. (2017). Economic Insight from Utahs Water Efficiency Supply Curve. Water, 9(3). works.bepress.com/eric_edwards/15/
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Progress 10/01/15 to 09/30/16
Outputs
Target Audience:Target Audience Stakeholders who will benefit from W3190's research and outreach include: agricultural producers and consumers, irrigation and conservation districts, private water-supply organizations, state. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Opportunities I advised and mentored nine undergraduate researchers working from January through October of 2016 on work related to this UAES project (objective 2) entitled "Unlocking Utah's Water Potential through Conservation." The students learned how to conduct academic research and write publishable academic papers, and developed expertise in water resource economics. Of the four undergraduate researchers that have graduated so far, this work provided experience and career guidance for two now employed in the water field and one in an economics master's program. Masters student Kyle Eager presented his work on drought and crop choice in western Kansas (objective 1) was presented at the Applied Economics Department Graduate Student Showcase where he gained experience and received feedback to help develop his presentation skills. PhD student Muyang Ge and myself attended the Native Waters on Arid Lands Tribal summit in Las Vegas, NV and the 2016 Tribal Water Summit in Fort Hall, ID where we learned more about issues affecting research on how land ownership affects water choices and economic outcomes (objective 3). How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Dissemination Work on objective 1 was presented to an academic audience at the Western Economics Association International Annual Meeting in Portland, OR: "Remedies for the Common Pool: The Case of California's Groundwater Management." Work on objective 2 was presented by undergraduate students in a poster session at Utah State and orally to the faculty in Utah State's Center for Water Efficient Landscaping. An academic paper "Insight from Utah's Water Efficiency Supply Curve," was submitted and is under revision at the journal Water. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?Plan of Work Objective 1: Publication of The Role of Bargaining Costs in Addressing the Depletion of Natural Resources: The Case of California's Groundwater with Ayres, A.B. and Libecap, G.D. January 2017: work will begin on urban water pricing project with cities of West Jordan, South Jordan, and Riverton, with Melissa Haeffner post-doc at Utah State Objective 2: Continued dissemination of findings of "Insight from Utah's Water Efficiency Supply Curve" to Utah legislators, water districts, and academic audiences. Objectives 2/3: Employment of 10 part-time undergraduate researchers for work on new project on the potential for intra- and inter-basin water trading on the Bear, Weber, and Jordan Rivers to reduce the cost of conserving water supply to protect ecosystem services in the Great Salt Lake.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Accomplishments Objective 1. Characterize bio-physical and economic factors (and interactions) that influence water-use decisions and related market or non-market outcomes. Statistical analysis of 430 groundwater basins in California indicates that basins select institutions to address overdraft based on the potential benefits: basins with high-value water and large common pool problems (high hydraulic conductivity) are more likely to adopt more stringent management controls. Basins with significant, and costly, overdraft are found to have characteristics indicative of high bargaining costs that may limit their ability to adopt stringent management: heterogeneous users (ag and urban), large basin size, and large numbers of pumping wells. Objective 2. Develop or enhance methods to address emerging water management issues. Study of outcome of water allocation institutions throughout the state of Utah suggests that an additional 1.7 million acre-feet of water is available via water conservation. The largest potential water savings, at the lowest cost, are in agriculture and outdoor residential water use, where more efficient application can maintain acreage of crops and lawns at current levels while dramatically reducing use. Objective 3. Evaluate and compare alternative water policy and management institutions. None.
Publications
|
Progress 11/10/14 to 09/30/15
Outputs
Target Audience:Target Audience Stakeholders who will benefit from W3190's research and outreach include: agricultural producers and consumers, irrigation and conservation districts, private water-supply organizations, state Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Opportunities 2016 W3190 Meeting in Lincoln, NE. Objective 1: Ongoing work: Groundwater and Climate Adaptation: A Study of the Ogallala Aquifer in Kansas (with Kyle Eager--supervised Masters student) examines availability of aquifer water and groundwater management's role in drought adaptation and resiliency on agricultural land in Kansas. Objective 2: Funded grant: Native Waters on Arid Lands for which Dr. Edwards is Co-PI offers training activities for graduate students in areas related to the project. Objective 3: Ongoing work: Water Availability and Agricultural Development in the American West (with Steven Smith at Haverford College) examines how institutional factors as well as development costs differ between surface and groundwater irrigators and how these differences affect agricultural outcomes. Ongoing work with Ryan Abman at San Diego State seeks to understand role of IRS tax policies on aquifer depletion and agricultural land value. Ongoing iUTAH supported undergraduate research supervised by Dr. Edwards offers training opportunities for undergraduate researchers in areas related to this project. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Dissemination Work on objectives 1-3 was presented in an academic publication, forthcoming, in the Journal of the Association of environmental and Resource Economists. Findings were presented to faculty and graduate students at an Earth Sciences seminar at Montana State University and also at the Society for Institutional & Organizational Economics Annual Conference and Western Economics Association International Annual Meeting. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?Plan of Work Continue work on Objective 3: Evaluate and compare alternative water policy and management institutions. Publish results of statistical analysis performed on Kansas data, ongoing work with Kyle Eager, supervised Masters student. Continue data development for ongoing IRS-aquifer project with Ryan Abman at SDSU. Continue examination of irrigation delivery method and agricultural development--ongoing work with Steven Smith at Haverford College.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Accomplishments Objective 1. Characterize bio-physical and economic factors (and interactions) that influence water-use decisions and related market or non-market outcomes. Analysis of individual agricultural parcel data in Kansas occurred after the completion of a large data set linking land sales, crop choice, and aquifer characteristics. Preliminary analysis indicates that crop rotation is affected by aquifer access and drought. Land value through time is shown to be related to water access, and more importantly, to differences in the characteristics of the aquifer, for instance saturated thickness. Objective 2. Develop or enhance methods to address emerging water management issues. Conducted preliminary analysis of groundwater management in California to assess potential methods for implementing the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA). Results indicate that basins select management that balances costs and benefits. Basins with large potential groundwater issues such as saltwater intrusion, high population growth, or high hydraulic conductivity select more expensive, and restrictive, management institutions for groundwater relative to other basins. Objective 3. Evaluate and compare alternative water policy and management institutions. Completed dataset linking parcel level data from 23 counties overlying High Plains Aquifer in western Kansas to land sale price (1985-2009) aquifer properties, and crop choice (2007-2012). Statistical analysis of groundwater management in western Kansas indicates that benefits of management accrue to landowners overlying more "shared" areas, as well as those that receive less precipitation. A landowner in a county with hydraulic conductivity one standard deviation higher sees a relative land value increase of 5-8% when management is implemented. Counties with lower recharge also see relative increases in land value. Changes in farm size and percentage of cropland in corn are also consistent with the proposition that the effect of management is unequal and depends on properties of the physical system. Completed database linking agricultural census data (1900-1978) with physical characteristics of High Plains aquifer (all states).
Publications
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