IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ags/aareaj/161904.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Missing markets for storage and the potential economic cost of expanding the spatial scope of water trade

Author

Listed:
  • Brennan, Donna C.

Abstract

A great deal of attention has been given in recent years to the question of externalities associated with water entitlements and how third parties can be protected without restricting opportunities for water trade. Yet one market failure that has received no attention at all is the missing market for storage that arises from the specification of water entitlements, particularly in Victoria where historically all storage decisions were made at the centralised level and where any additional carryover was treated as common property. The economic significance of the missing market for storage is demonstrated using an empirical model that represents the spatial-temporal pattern of irrigation water demand in the Goulburn Valley and decisions regarding inter-year storage of water in Lake Eildon. It is shown that, because irrigators have no incentive to trade-off the benefit of current use (or sale) with the value of water storage, there is an erosion of reliability when opportunities for trade are broadened. The empirical results demonstrate that the loss in economic value associated with reduced reliability are as large as the gains from trade, so there is no net benefit from trade.

Suggested Citation

  • Brennan, Donna C., 2008. "Missing markets for storage and the potential economic cost of expanding the spatial scope of water trade," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 54(4), pages 1-15.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:aareaj:161904
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.161904
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/161904/files/j.1467-8489.2008.00443.x.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.161904?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Donna Brennan, 2006. "Water policy reform in Australia: lessons from the Victorian seasonal water market ," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 50(3), pages 403-423, September.
    2. M. D. Young & J. C. McColl, 2003. "Robust Reform: The Case for a New Water Entitlement System for Australia," Australian Economic Review, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, vol. 36(2), pages 225-234, June.
    3. repec:cup:cbooks:9780521326162 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Anna Heaney & Gavan Dwyer & Stephen Beare & Deborah Peterson & Lili Pechey, 2006. "Third-party effects of water trading and potential policy responses ," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 50(3), pages 277-293, September.
    5. repec:cup:cbooks:9780521023399 is not listed on IDEAS
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Hrozencik, R. Aaron, 2018. "Energy, Food, and Water; Electricity Cooperative Pricing and Groundwater Irrigation Decisions," 2018 Annual Meeting, August 5-7, Washington, D.C. 274322, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    2. Adam Loch & Henning Bjornlund & Ronald McIver, 2011. "Achieving Targeted Environmental Flows: Alternative Allocation and Trading Models under Scarce Supply—Lessons from the Australian Reform Process," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 29(4), pages 745-760, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Donna Brennan, 2008. "Missing markets for storage and the potential economic cost of expanding the spatial scope of water trade," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 52(4), pages 471-485, December.
    2. Brooks, Robert & Harris, Edwyna, 2008. "Efficiency gains from water markets: Empirical analysis of Watermove in Australia," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 95(4), pages 391-399, April.
    3. Sarah Ann Wheeler, 2022. "Debunking Murray‐Darling Basin water trade myths," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 66(4), pages 797-821, October.
    4. Brooks, Robert & Harris, Edwyna, 2014. "Price leadership and information transmission in Australian water allocation markets," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 145(C), pages 83-91.
    5. Edwyna Harris, 2011. "The Impact of Institutional Path Dependence on Water Market Efficiency in Victoria, Australia," Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA), Springer;European Water Resources Association (EWRA), vol. 25(15), pages 4069-4080, December.
    6. Qureshi, Muhammad Ejaz & Connor, Jeffery D. & Kirby, Mac & Mainuddin, Mohammed, 2007. "Economic assessment of acquiring water for environmental flows in the Murray Basin," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 51(3), pages 1-21.
    7. Azad, Md A.S. & Ancev, Tihomir, 2010. "Using ecological indices to measure economic and environmental performance of irrigated agriculture," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(8), pages 1731-1739, June.
    8. Guerra Vallejos, Ernesto & Bobenrieth Hochfarber, Eugenio & Bobenrieth Hochfarber, Juan & Wright, Brian D., 2021. "Solving dynamic stochastic models with multiple occasionally binding constraints," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 105(C).
    9. Neal Hughes & Manannan Donoghoe & Linden Whittle, 2020. "Farm Level Effects of On‐Farm Irrigation Infrastructure Programs in the Southern Murray–Darling Basin," Australian Economic Review, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, vol. 53(4), pages 494-516, December.
    10. Chi H. Truong, 2014. "A Two Factor Model for Water Prices and Its Implications for Evaluating Real Options and Other Water Price Derivatives," Canadian Journal of Agricultural Economics/Revue canadienne d'agroeconomie, Canadian Agricultural Economics Society/Societe canadienne d'agroeconomie, vol. 62(1), pages 23-45, March.
    11. Naiming He & Ying Shi & Rijia Ding, 2024. "Does the Water Rights Trading Policy Improve Water-Use Efficiency? An Environmental Policy Evaluation from China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(8), pages 1-14, April.
    12. Sarah Wheeler & Henning Bjornlund & Martin Shanahan & Alec Zuo, 2008. "Price elasticity of water allocations demand in the Goulburn-Murray Irrigation District ," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 52(1), pages 37-55, March.
    13. Robert Brooks & Edwyna Harris & Yovina Joymungul, 2013. "Price clustering in Australian water markets," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(6), pages 677-685, February.
    14. Michael D. Young & Jim C. McColl, 2009. "Double trouble: the importance of accounting for and defining water entitlements consistent with hydrological realities ," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 53(1), pages 19-35, January.
    15. Potgieter, Petrus H., 2010. "Water and energy in South Africa – managing scarcity," MPRA Paper 23360, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. Changhai Qin & Shan Jiang & Yong Zhao & Yongnan Zhu & Qingming Wang & Lizhen Wang & Junlin Qu & Ming Wang, 2022. "Research on Water Rights Trading and Pricing Model between Agriculture and Energy Development in Ningxia, China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(23), pages 1-15, November.
    17. John Freebairn, 2005. "Issues in the Design of Water Markets," Melbourne Institute Working Paper Series wp2005n18, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne.
    18. Ansink, Erik & Houba, Harold, 2012. "Market power in water markets," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 237-252.
    19. Mallawaarachchi, Thilak & Auricht, Christopher & Loch, Adam & Adamson, David & Quiggin, John, 2020. "Water allocation in Australia’s Murray–Darling Basin: Managing change under heightened uncertainty," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 345-369.
    20. Productivity Commission, 2008. "Towards Urban Water Reform: A Discussion Paper," Research Papers 0801, Productivity Commission, Government of Australia.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:aareaj:161904. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aaresea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.