Written Assessment 1 covers general economic concepts and environmental valuation techniques and requires short-answer responses.

As a guideline, the total length of your response should be around 1000 words.

Diagrams should be used to illustrate specific aspects of the response. Please ensure that you correctly cite/reference all sources of diagrams used, unless they are original and composed by you. This is an important aspect of academic integrity. It is also important that you familiarize yourself with the Plagiarism policy. The University Academic Misconduct Procedure Policy is available on the CQUniversity website.

Further details of the Assessment are available on the Moodle page for the unit.

Late submissions will incur penalties (5% of the total assessment marks for each day the work is overdue). All assignment extension requests must be forwarded through the Moodle Assignment Extension portal with verifiable supporting documents.

Assessment Criteria for Assignment 1 are as follows:

(a) Demonstrate a clear understanding and purpose of economic theory and models.

(b) Application of economic theory and models to given real-life and hypothetical scenarios.

(c) Demonstrate a clear understanding of the selected valuation technique and its application.

(d) A critical review of the key strengths and weaknesses of the relevant valuation technique.

The focus of this assignment is to test your understanding of the issues around renewable and non-renewable resources, and the issues in dealing with long time horizons. In the assignment, you should choose a major environmental issue in Australia that can be classified as a renewable or non-renewable resource management issue. Issues may be drawn from a number of areas, including Energy, Minerals, and Forestry. To complete the assignment, you should:

1. Provide a brief overview of the issue
2. Identify issues with the rate of resource allocation and the time horizon issues
3. Explain how marginal benefits and costs of extraction or harvest can change over time
4. Identify the appropriate economic analysis to identify optimal rates of harvest or extraction.
5. Identify the implications of extraction or harvest rates in terms of sustainable development.
6. Review available government policies to deal with these kinds of issues, and identify preferred options to address the issue of interest.

This assignment is to be written as a single essay and include diagrams and references. You should aim to develop a logical framework for your arguments in a structure that allows you to address the key questions posed.

The choice of a particular environmental issue is yours as a way of bringing some interest to the topic. Do not spend too much time describing the case but use it to demonstrate the economic principles that you have learned in the Unit.

There are many possible types of environmental issues that you might focus on. Try to narrow it down in some way to a particular case study or development proposal so that it is easier to apply different frameworks to the issue of interest. The chosen environmental issue can be at any scale (i.e. local, regional, national or international), but remember that smaller, less complex, and well-defined problems are generally easier to analyse than larger multi-faceted issues.

It is important to describe what type of economic principles and analysis can be applied to evaluate the problem so that it is clear how to conceptualise the issues in economic terms.

Other details to note are:

• As a guideline, the length of the main body of your essay should be around 2000 words or so, excluding references.
• Diagrams should be used to illustrate specific aspects and please ensure that you correctly cite/reference all sources including diagrams used since this is an important aspect of academic integrity.
• The list of references should form the last page or two, at the end of the assessment. The APA Referencing style should be used.
• Further instructions on assignment submission, formatting, referencing, etc. are provided on the Moodle site for this unit.

Assessment Criteria for Assignment 2 are as follows:

1. Selection and description of a suitable case study issue relevant to the assignment topic
2. Demonstrate a clear understanding and purpose of the economic concepts involved
3. Demonstrate knowledge about application of economic analysis
4. Critical evaluation of the case study issues and policy mechanisms
5. Standard of writing, explanation and referencing.

The focus of this assignment is to identify an environmental issue that involves pollution or an open-access resource and use it as a case study to explain how the problem can be evaluated using economic analysis and to identify appropriate policy mechanisms. The case study approach means that students can choose a major environmental issue in Australia that can be classified as a common pool resource problem or a pollution problem. Common pool problems are an open-access or tragedy of the commons type of problem, while pollution problems are examples of negative externalities. Some environmental problems, such as air pollution, exhibit both characteristics and are sometimes called 'wicked' problems because of the difficulties of addressing them.

Students need to complete the following tasks for their case study:

1. Provide a brief overview of the issue.
2. Explain in economic terms why the problem exists, and who bears the costs.
3. Identify the appropriate economic analysis that can be applied to identify more sustainable or efficient resource use.
4. Review economic mechanisms that are available to address these types of environmental problems.
5. Critically review current government policies that are in place and the extent to which they are consistent with economic mechanisms.

This assignment is to be written as a single essay and should include references. You should aim to develop a logical framework for your arguments in a structure that allows you to address the key questions posed.

The choice of a particular case study is yours as a way of bringing some interest to the topic. Do not spend too much time on the descriptive aspects of the case study but use it to demonstrate the economic principles that you have learned in this Unit.

There are many possible types of environmental issues that you might focus on. Try to narrow it down in some way to a particular case study or development proposal so that it is easier to apply different frameworks to the issue of interest.  The case study can be at any scale (i.e. local, regional, national or international), but remember that smaller, less complex, and specific problems are generally easier to analyse than larger multi-faceted issues.

It is important to describe what type of economic principles and analysis can be applied to evaluate the problem so that it is clear how to conceptualise the issues in economic terms.

Other details to note are:

• As a guideline, the total length of the essay should be around 3000 words or so, excluding references.
• Diagrams should be used to illustrate specific aspects and please ensure that you correctly cite/reference all sources including diagrams used since this is an important aspect of academic integrity.
• The list of references should form the last page or two, at the end of the assessment. The APA Referencing style should be used.
• Further instructions on assignment submission, formatting, referencing, etc. are provided on the Moodle site for this unit.

Assessment Criteria for Assignment 3 are as follows:

1. Selection and description of a suitable case study issue relevant to the assignment topic.
2. Demonstrate a clear understanding and purpose of the economic concepts involved.
3. Demonstrate knowledge about the application of economic analysis.
4. Critical evaluation of the case study issues and policy mechanisms.
5. Standard of writing, explanation and referencing.