Impacts of Uncertainty on Policy Costs of Managing Nonpoint Source Ground Water Contamination

Ground water contamination from agricultural nitrates poses potential adverse health effects to a large segment of the rural population of the United States. Unlike point source contaminants, these contaminants are often stochastic in nature. A mixed integer programming model of a representative dairy farm in Rockingham County, Virginia with stochastic constraints (generated by a physical transport model) on nitrate loading to ground water and silage production was used to simulate the impacts of considering the annual variabili in nitrate loading on policy costs. The results X. imply substantially igher policy costs than when average loadings alone were considered.