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The impact of pollution abatement investments on production technology: a nonparametric approach

Author

Listed:
  • Jean Pierre Huiban

    (INRA-ALISS, France)

  • Camilla Mastromarco

    (University of Salento, Lecce, Italy)

  • Antonio Musolesi

    (University of Ferrara, Italy)

  • Michel Simioni

    (INRA, UMR 1110 MOISA, Montpellier, France)

Abstract

This paper estimates the impact of pollution abatement investments on the production technology of firms by pursuing two new directions. First, we take advantage of recent econometric developments in productivity, effciency analysis and nonparametric kernel regression by adopting a conditional nonparametric frontier analysis. Second, we focus not only on the average effect but also search for potential nonlinearities. We provide new results suggesting that pollution abatement capital affects with a bell-shaped fashion technological catch-up (ineffciency distribution) and does not affect technological change (shifts in the frontier). These results have relevant implications both for modeling and for the purposes of advice on environmentally friendly policy.

Suggested Citation

  • Jean Pierre Huiban & Camilla Mastromarco & Antonio Musolesi & Michel Simioni, 2018. "The impact of pollution abatement investments on production technology: a nonparametric approach," SEEDS Working Papers 0918, SEEDS, Sustainability Environmental Economics and Dynamics Studies, revised Sep 2018.
    • Handle: RePEc:srt:wpaper:0918
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    References listed on IDEAS

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