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Author ORCID Identifier

https://orcid.org/0009-0007-0190-6575

Date Available

4-20-2026

Year of Publication

2026

Document Type

Doctoral Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

College

Agriculture, Food and Environment

Department/School/Program

Agricultural Economics

Faculty

Steven Buck

Faculty

Yoko Kusunose

Abstract

As extreme weather events become more frequent and more intense, understanding their effects becomes increasingly important. This dissertation examines those effects and related policy questions across three essays.

The first essay demonstrates that methodological choices in weather data construction can meaningfully affect estimated agricultural impacts of extreme weather. Using corn yields across the U.S. Corn Belt, it shows that constructing nonlinear weather measures after spatial interpolation reduces measured exposure to extreme heat and changes both estimated yield impacts and their downstream economic implications.

The second essay examines how weather exposure affects drinking water quality. It shows that microbial contamination responds quickly to precipitation intensity, while disinfection byproducts accumulate more gradually under sustained warmth over longer periods. These distinct response patterns suggest different monitoring and treatment strategies for each contamination pathway.

The third essay examines how parcel characteristics shape water demand elasticity, conservation under a drought mandate, and the resulting welfare effects. It shows that both demand responsiveness and the welfare costs of conservation differ across communities with different underlying characteristics. The results suggest that a mixed strategy that relies more on prices where demand is more elastic and on mandates where price response is weaker could lower total welfare costs.

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

https://doi.org/10.13023/etd.2026.105

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