Economic Feasibility Study for Improving Drinking Water Quality: A Case Study of Arsenic Contamination in Rural Argentina

MARIA MOLINOS-SENANTE; A. PÉREZ CARRERA; FRANCESC HERNANDEZ-SANCHO; ALICIA FERNANDEZ CIRELLI; RAMON SALA-GARRIDO

ECOHEALTH

SPRINGER

Lugar: Berlin; Año: 2014 vol. 11 p. 476 - 490

1612-9202

Abstract: Economic studies are essential in evaluating the potential external investment support and/orinternal tariffs available to improve drinking water quality. Cost?benefit analysis (CBA) is a useful tool to assessthe economic feasibility of such interventions, i.e. to take some form of action to improve the drinking waterquality. CBA should involve the market and non-market effects associated with the intervention. An economicframework was proposed in this study, which estimated the health avoided costs and the environmentalbenefits for the net present value of reducing the pollutant concentrations in drinking water. We conducted anempirical application to assess the economic feasibility of removing arsenic from water in a rural area ofArgentina. Four small-scale methods were evaluated in our study. The results indicated that the inclusion ofnon-market benefits was integral to supporting investment projects. In addition, the application of the proposedframework will provide water authorities with more complete information for the decision-makingprocess