Eva Horvathova - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Eva Horvathova

One Ecosystem

Understanding the factors affecting drinking water production costs is crucial for choosing a cos... more Understanding the factors affecting drinking water production costs is crucial for choosing a cost-effective solution for public drinking water supply systems. An important determinant of water treatment costs is the purification of raw water. Despite water purification being a well-acknowledged ecosystem service, its monetary value has not been assessed much yet. We present the first study analysing the determinants of drinking water production costs and valuating groundwater purification in the Czech Republic. We tested the impact of the type of raw water, the amount of drinking water produced, electric power consumption and treatment technologies and chemicals. The results suggested that drinking water production from groundwater was cheaper than from surface water. Even though drinking water production from groundwater was cheaper than from surface water, the application of some technologies, for example, chlorine or manganese removal, increased the production cost. Hence ground...

Scientia Agriculturae Bohemica, 2020

In recent decades, green tramway tracks have still more often been installed in many cities as an... more In recent decades, green tramway tracks have still more often been installed in many cities as an alternative to standard rails placed on concrete sleepers or grooved rails since the vegetated tracks are beneficial to urban dwellers. In this article, we summarize and compare the benefits of grass and low-maintenance tramway tracks and link them with their investment and maintenance costs in two Czech cities. We conclude that grass surfaces offer a slightly higher rainwater retention capacity, while the rest of the benefits are similar for grass and low-maintenance surfaces. The investment costs are also similar, however, the maintenance costs are 30× higher for grass surfaces than for the low-maintenance ones.

Acta Universitatis Agriculturae et Silviculturae Mendelianae Brunensis, 2020

We examine why firms voluntarily implement environmental management systems. Employing the ISO 14... more We examine why firms voluntarily implement environmental management systems. Employing the ISO 14001 management system and using firm-level data for the Czech Republic, we find that environmental management systems are typically adopted by large firms and by those firms that initially pollute the environment more. These systems are more commonly implemented by firms operating in service industries. On the other hand, we find little support that the adoption of environmental management systems is influenced by the firm’s financial performance and labor costs.

Urban Forestry & Urban Greening, 2021

Cooling is one of the most important benefits of street trees, yet city planners lack estimates o... more Cooling is one of the most important benefits of street trees, yet city planners lack estimates of the value of this benefit. Estimation of the value of the cooling effect could help to strengthen the case for investment in a tree cover as a part of the urban infrastructure for climate change adaptation. This article aims to address this research gap by presenting a novel application of a replacement cost method using the costs of parasols for estimating the value of shade provided by urban trees. Using the method, we calculated the net present value of the shade from a generic tree and used these estimates in a case study in Prague, Czech Republic. The results showed that the costs of tree planting and maintenance were higher than the estimated shading benefits in the short term (20-30 years), but the situation reversed when the tree life expectancy increased (> 40 years). Street trees are hence a long-term investment in terms of microclimate regulation. The proposed approach can assist city planners with an assessment of microclimate regulation by urban trees as it can be easily applied with local data, and can complement other methods to show the wider benefits of urban trees.

Comparative Economic Studies, 2019

The authors provide the summary of the most important findings of the early models of economics o... more The authors provide the summary of the most important findings of the early models of economics of crime, namely the models of Becker, Ehrlich and Heineke. These models study rational individual decision-making about entering into illegal activities. Probability and siže of punishment, attitudes towards risk, gains form crime and income are the main variables which causes the results of the individual behavior. The authors also discuss weaknesses of these models such as its static nature or ignoring interactive decision-making. The relationship to the theory of optimal law enforcement is also presented.

Empirical Economics

We examine the causal effect of natural resource discoveries on income inequality using the synth... more We examine the causal effect of natural resource discoveries on income inequality using the synthetic control method on data from 1947 to 2009. We focus on the natural discoveries in Denmark, Netherlands and Norway in the 1960-1970s and use top 1% and top 10% income share as the measure of income inequality. Many previous studies have been concerned that natural resources may increase income inequality. To the contrary, our results suggest that natural resources decrease income inequality or have no effect. We attribute this effect to the high institutional quality of countries we examine.

Ecological Economics, 2010

What do we know about the impact of environmental regulations/performance on firm performance? Af... more What do we know about the impact of environmental regulations/performance on firm performance? After more than three decades of theoretical as well as empirical research, the results seem to remain inconclusive. Some papers suggest that regulations harm firms, while others claim that regulations may contribute positively and give an impetus to innovations. Therefore, I examine the heterogeneity in financialenvironmental performance nexus, empirically carrying out a meta-regression analysis of 64 outcomes from 37 empirical studies to uncover the underlying factors, which can influence the observed variation in the empirical results. The results suggest both that the empirical method used matters for the nexus and that the likelihood of finding a negative link between environmental and financial performance significantly increases when using simple correlation coefficients instead of more advanced econometric analysis. The results also indicate that the portfolio studies tend to report a negative link between environmental and financial performance. This likely reflects the omitted factors in portfolio studies. The positive link is found more frequently in common law countries than in civil law countries. The results also point to the importance of appropriate time coverage to establish a positive link between environmental and financial performance.

Discussion Papers in Economics, Nov 5, 2008

... Eva Horváthová (ev.horvathova@gmail.com) is a Ph.D. candidate at the Fac-ulty of Humanities, ... more ... Eva Horváthová (ev.horvathova@gmail.com) is a Ph.D. candidate at the Fac-ulty of Humanities, Charles University, Czech Republic. ... the sample interest rates are well correlated with the aggregate interest rates, which follow the development of the policy rate (two-week repo). ...

Emerging Markets Finance and Trade, 2010