The perception of environmental risk in the contexts of hypothetical assessment. The case of urban infrastructure for the waste disposal

This work highlights how, within the context of contingent valuation, supporting the assessment of monetary measures of mitigation of environmental damages, has not been sufficiently clarified the role played by the perception of environmental risk, particularly in an ex ante context, where the effect of psychological anchoring to the status quo and the amount / type of available information have an important role driving the individual preferences. The contribution to experimental economics - of which the contingent valuation takes share - of the theory of choice under uncertainty and of behavioural economics is briefly traced and, in order to provide empirical evidence, the results of a choice experiment implemented in Turin, in order to assess the effect of the disamenity due to the location of solid waste infrastructure, are showing.