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Public investments in sustainable technology: an evaluation of North Carolina's Green Business Fund

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  • Michael J. Hall

Abstract

North Carolina's Green Business Fund, a state-level sustainability-technology program, is evaluated in terms of net economic surplus. To conduct this evaluation, this paper develops and implements an economic model from which values of producer and consumer surplus can be measured. Data limitations drive modeling choices, namely the model must be applicable when the researcher is unable to decompose revenues into separate prices and quantities. The method used in this paper is an extension of one previously used to examine SBIR programs facing similar data limitations. An additional facet of the modeling method is a specification such that the presence of an existing technology can also be taken into account. This allows the evaluation to focus only on newly created surplus. The findings from this evaluation suggest that the Green Business Fund has resulted in a positive net social surplus and, when imposing an elasticity of demand drawn from the literature on other sustainability-based technologies, a benefit-to-cost ratio of above 2.

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  • Michael J. Hall, 2015. "Public investments in sustainable technology: an evaluation of North Carolina's Green Business Fund," Economics of Innovation and New Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(5), pages 436-456, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:ecinnt:v:24:y:2015:i:5:p:436-456
    DOI: 10.1080/10438599.2014.988502
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Jaffe, Adam B. & Newell, Richard G. & Stavins, Robert N., 2005. "A tale of two market failures: Technology and environmental policy," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(2-3), pages 164-174, August.
    2. Stuart D. Allen & Stephen K. Layson & Albert N. Link, 2013. "Public gains from entrepreneurial research: Inferences about the economic value of public support of the Small Business Innovation Research program," Chapters, in: Public Support of Innovation in Entrepreneurial Firms, chapter 6, pages 105-112, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    3. Albert Link, 1999. "Public/Private Partnerships In The United States," Industry and Innovation, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 6(2), pages 191-217.
    4. David Anthoff & Robert Hahn, 2010. "Government failure and market failure: on the inefficiency of environmental and energy policy," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 26(2), pages 197-224, Summer.
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    Cited by:

    1. Link, Albert, 2022. "An Assessment and Evaluation of the U.S. Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Program," UNCG Economics Working Papers 22-8, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Department of Economics.

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