Assessing policy strategies for the promotion of environmental technologies: A review of India's National Solar Mission

There is widespread consensus that no individual policy instrument but rather a “policy mix” is needed to effectively drive the development and diffusion of environmental technologies. However, what exactly constitutes such a policy mix remains largely undefined. This paper takes this discussion a step further by developing a comprehensive framework for assessing and comparing policy approaches for the promotion of environmental technologies. It begins with a critical review of existing policy mix concepts, pointing out key shortcomings. To address the identified challenges, it proposes the concept of a policy strategy as an alternative framework for policy assessment and comparison. This serves as the basis for integrating findings from the literature on environmental innovation and technological change in a comprehensive framework for assessing policy strategies for the promotion of environmental technologies. The framework is then applied for the assessment of India's National Solar Mission, the country's strategy for promoting solar energy technologies. Based on the resulting findings, the potential and limitations of the proposed framework are discussed.