An Integrated Framework for Analyzing Technology Subsidies

补贴是决策者在考虑如何最好地支持消费者采用和生产者创新新技术时可用的众多工具之一，但对某些技术来说，考虑补贴的主要影响可能存在问题。例如，尽管对可再生能源、生物燃料、高效照明和电器等能源技术的补贴历史悠久，但评估补贴对这些技术影响的分析基础尚未牢固建立。先前对能源技术补贴的评估采用了两种分析观点之一；该分析要么：(i)将补贴成本与消费者采用技术增加所带来的货币化环境效益进行比较，但忽略了补贴对技术演进的影响；或者（ii）考察了补贴对技术生产者市场竞争力的影响，包括对未来技术创新的影响，但忽略了环境效益。这两种观点都提供了宝贵的见解，但两种观点都不能完全解释补贴成本和收益的范围，孤立地基于任何一种观点的政策处方必然是有限的。通过在一个单一的综合框架内结合这两种分析观点，本项目将使我们能够估计和比较替代形式的技术补贴对消费者采用、生产者创新和由此产生的效益的长期净影响。该研究将应用该框架来估计不同补贴轨迹（补贴类型、水平和时间）对特定新兴技术（包括电动汽车、太阳能光伏和风能）的净影响。研究结果将促进对环境政策、技术创新政策和定量政策分析的理解。本研究的主要成果是综合分析框架，可用于为政策决策提供信息，以决定补贴哪些技术、补贴支持的水平和时间，以及其他与政策相关的问题。该框架是灵活的：它可立即适用于分析其他工业对新技术的补贴，也可扩展到研究补贴以外的干预形式。集成框架包括三种类型的模型。采用模型使用实际价格和技术销售数据，预测消费者对技术的采用是消费者补贴调整后的技术投资的函数。基于经验曲线方法和可比技术的实际成本/经验数据的技术进步模型预测了由于消费者对技术的累积采用而导致的技术成本降低，并隔离了可归因于补贴的成本降低。排放模型利用环境经济学和生命周期排放研究界开发的数据，将技术采用的单位转换为减排量的估计，并将减排量的估计转换为货币化社会效益的估计。这些模型的整合产生了对技术补贴的时间贴现净效应的估计，这些净效应解释了与以下方面相关的补贴成本：(i)消费者采用该技术带来的直接环境效益（货币化的减排），以及（ii）由补贴刺激的技术改进所产生的与创新相关的间接效益，这些效益在未来会产生额外的消费者采用和效益。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Subsidies are among the many tools available to policy makers as they consider how best to support consumer adoption and producer innovation of new technologies, but accounting for the major effects of subsidies can be problematic for some technologies. For example, despite a long history of subsidizing energy technologies such as renewable electricity sources, biofuels, and efficient lighting and appliances, the analytical basis for evaluating the effects of subsidies on these technologies is not yet firmly established. Prior assessments of energy technology subsidies employed one of two analytical perspectives; the analysis either: (i) compared subsidy costs to the monetized environmental benefits resulting from increased consumer adoption of the technology, but ignored the subsidy's impact on technology evolution; or (ii) examined the subsidy's impact on the market competitiveness of technology producers, including future technology innovations, but ignored the environmental benefits. Both perspectives contribute valuable insights, but neither perspective fully accounts for the range of subsidy costs and benefits, and policy prescriptions based on either perspective in isolation are necessarily limited. By combining the two analytical perspectives within a single integrated framework, this project will allow us to estimate and compare the long-run net effects of alternative forms of technology subsidies on consumer adoption, producer innovation, and the resultant benefits. The research will apply the framework to estimate the net effects of different subsidy trajectories (types, levels, and timing of subsidies) for particular emerging technologies -- including electric cars, solar photovoltaics, and wind power. The results will advance understanding of environmental policy, technology innovation policy, and quantitative policy analysis. The major product of this research, the integrated analytical framework, can be used to inform policy decisions about which technologies to subsidize, the level and timing of subsidy support, and other policy-relevant questions. The framework is flexible: it is immediately applicable to the analysis of subsidies for new technologies in other industries, and could also be extended to study forms of intervention other than subsidies.The integrated framework comprises three types of models. An adoption model, using actual price and technology sales data, forecasts consumer adoption of the technology as a function of the consumer's subsidy-adjusted investment in the technology. A technological progress model, based on experience-curve methods and actual cost/experience data for comparable technologies, forecasts technology cost reductions that result from accumulated consumer adoption of the technology, and isolates the cost reductions attributable to the subsidy. An emissions model, using data developed by the environmental economics and life-cycle emissions research communities, converts units of technology adoption into estimates of emissions reduction, and converts estimated emissions reductions into estimates of monetized social benefit. The integration of these models produces estimates of the time-discounted net effects of a technology subsidy that account for the subsidy cost in relation to: (i) the direct environmental benefits (monetized emissions reductions) from consumer adoption of the technology, and (ii) the indirect innovation-related benefits derived from technical improvements, stimulated by the subsidy, that yield additional consumer adoption and benefits in the future.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.