A nonparametric method to estimate a technical change effect on marginal abatement costs of U.S. coal power plants, published in Energy Economics

Posted on September 29, 2014October 19, 2014 by ajohnson

This paper develops a method to investigate the effects of technical change on marginal abatement costs (MAC). This was the second chapter of Maethee Mekaroonreung Ph.D. dissertation. The research was motivated by a paper by Erin Baker that suggested that technical change does not always reduce MAC. In their analysis they made parametric assumptions to investigate a variety of models relating technical change and MAC. In this paper we used nonparametric methods to investigate this question for boilers in coal fired power plants. We find that while technical change reduces MAC, non-technical change related to changes in abatement input costs, production input levels, and pollutant level change is a larger effect. So the investment and installation pollution abatement equipment has lead to larger MACs.

Abstract
The literature usually assumes that technical change reduces marginal abatement cost; however, recent results suggest that precisely the opposite occurs. This paper proposes a nonparametric method to determine the effect of technical change on marginal abatement cost. The method decomposes NOx marginal abatement cost changes in 2000–2004 and in 2004–2008 for 325 boilers operating in 134 U.S. bituminous coal power plant into technical and non-technical change effects. We find that technical change reduces the NOx marginal cost about 28.3% in 2000–2004 and 26.5% in 2004–2008. However, more stringent regulations enacted the NOx budget program results in lower NOx emission levels as plant operators install more advanced NOx abatement equipment which in turn causes an overall increase in marginal abatement cost.

Nonparametric measurement of productivity and efficiency in education, published in Annals of Operations Research

Posted on September 29, 2014October 9, 2014 by ajohnson

This paper was written in 2010 and appeared on-line in 2011. It has taken Annals of Operations Research more than 3 years to publish the paper. This paper combines a deterministic contextual variables model with a Malmquist productivity analysis. The methods are applied to Ohio school data. See the abstract below for more details.

This paper was written with John Ruggiero one of the most widely cited researchers in the area of DEA. John and I have written several papers over the years and he has acted as a mention to me. He is generally considered to be the life of the conference as most academic conferences he attends.

Abstract
Nondiscretionary environmental inputs are critical in explaining relative efficiency differences and productivity changes in public sector applications. For example, the literature on education production shows that school districts perform better when student poverty is lower. In this paper, we extend the nonparametric approach to decompose the Malmquist Productivity Index suggested by Färe et al. (American Economic Rewiew 84:66–83, 1994) into efficiency, technological and environmental changes. The approach is applied to analyze educational production of Ohio school districts. Applying the extended approach in an analysis of the educational production of 604 school districts in Ohio, we find changes in environmental harshness are the primary drivers in productivity changes of underperforming school districts, while technical progress drives the performance of top performing school districts.

June 23-27 International Material Handling Research Colloquium – Cincinnati, OH

Posted on September 29, 2014October 13, 2014 by ajohnson

The International Material Handling Research Colloquium (IMHRC) purpose is to share world-class research accomplishments, projects and trends in the field of material handling, facility logistics and intralogistics.

It aims to facilitate dialog and collaborative research by teams of university researchers on leading edge topics of interest to end users as well as technology and solutions providers. The Colloquium operates on an immersion philosophy of complete participation by all participants in all the Colloquium events. The Colloquium program includes a mix of invited presentations, facilitated discussions, poster sessions, facility tours and social events.

The first Research Colloquium took place June 1990 on the corporate campus of Litton Industrial Automated Systems in Hebron, Kentucky, USA. The success of this Colloquium prompted the conduct of other Colloquia: in 1992 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA at the corporate headquarters of Rockwell Automation/Allen-Bradley; in 1994 in Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA at the corporate headquarters of Rapistan Demag Corporation; in 1996 in ‘s-Hertogenbosch, the Netherlands, at the corporate headquarters of Vanderlande Industries; in 1998 in Chandler, Arizona, USA at the headquarters of Motorola Corporation; in 2000 in York, Pennsylvania, USA at the headquarters of St. Onge Company; in 2002 in Portland, Maine, USA at the headquarters Southworth International; in 2004 in Graz, Austria on the campus of Technical University of Graz with additional financial support provided by Knapp, Salomon, SSI Schaefer Peem, and TGW; in 2006 in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA at the headquarters of Daifuku America; in 2008 in Dortmund, Germany hosted by the Fraunhofer Institute for Material Flow and Logistics (IML) at the University of Dortmund with support provided by Beumer and Savoye; in 2010 in Milwaukee, USA, financially supported by RedPrairie and HK Systems, with the Center for Supply Chain Management at Marquette University serving as academic host; and in 2012 in Gardanne, France, hosted and financially supported by École Nationale Supérieure des Mines de SaintÉtienne (EMSE) who served as academic host. The 2014 industrial host is Intelligrated.

Andrew Johnson’s research lab presented “Order batching with time constraints in a parallel-aisle warehouse: a multiple-policy approach”. This paper investigate the potential gains in terms of reduced blocking and delays in order picking systems when multiple routing strategies and order gather strategies are considered. The paper will appear as part of the conference proceedings.

http://www.mhi.org/cicmhe/colloquium