Le scelte di localizzazione delle opere pubbliche: il fenomeno Nimby

The paper shows that siting procedures taking local preferences into account should be preferred when the heterogeneity in preferences across communities is large relative to that in constructing and operating costs. Preferences are better elicited through auction-like mechanisms rather than multilateral negotiations if: credible information about the risks are available; conflicting preferences at the local level can be preliminarily aggregated; compensations are mainly monetary. The conflict between highly centralized siting procedures and highly decentralized administrative institutions is identified as a critical point.