Environmental Assessment on Energy and Sustainability by Data Envelopment Analysis

23RETURNS TO DAMAGE AND DAMAGES TO RETURN

23.1 INTRODUCTION

Chapter 21 has discussed the two disposability concepts under a possible occurrence of “undesirable congestion (UC),” due to a capacity limit in part or all of a whole production facility, and another possible occurrence of “desirable congestion (DC)” due to eco‐technology innovation. In this chapter, technology innovation contains wide implications regarding not only engineering contributions but also managerial challenges (e,g., a fuel mix shift from coal to natural gas or renewable energy for generation).

The underlying philosophy of this book is that we may overcome our current difficulty on the global warming and climate change by combining technology development with managerial challenges. It is believed that the global climate issue, influencing all over the world, can be solved by engineering capabilities and natural science that are equipped with managerial and economic wisdoms in social science. This chapter documents an analytical rationale regarding how DEA can serve as an empirical basis for connecting among such different capabilities in engineering, natural and social sciences.

As an extension of Chapters 20 and 21, the purpose of this chapter is to discuss UC under natural disposability and DC under managerial disposability, along with their linkages to returns to damage (RTD) and damages to return (DTR). This chapter also equips DEA with an analytical capability of “explorative analysis” for multiplier restriction, ...