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ing toxicologic and human health data—data that may suggest that particular
current commercial products are problematic from a health and safety perspec-
tive. Highlighting or publicizing such data could provide early hints to manufac-
turers that replacements may be needed in the future and prompt enterprising
companies and entrepreneurs to work to develop alternative means of satisfying
desired customer outcomes. The committee does not advise EPA to try to de-
velop solutions, inasmuch as the research environment in the agency is unlikely
to be able to duplicate the resources and competitive pressures that drive the
commercial product-development market. But providing clear signals of poten-
tial future environmental opportunities to the commercial sphere may be enough
to prompt the creation of improvements.
Second, EPA can and does provide resources to support private-sector in-
novation directly. Examples are the EPA Small Business Innovation Research
program and enhanced awards programs, such as the Presidential Green Chem-
istry Awards. Targeting of such programs to address problems that EPA scien-
tists find particularly intractable or to address problems that it does not have the
capacity to address can be a valuable means of stimulating the entrepreneurial
community to attack problems of direct interest to the agency. To have the re-
sources needed to support private-sector innovation directly at the levels neces-
sary to produce results, the agency would benefit from collaborating and part-
nering with other agencies that have far greater budgets and resources and
similar or complementary innovation challenges, for example, the National In-
stitute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the Department of Energy, and the
Department of Defense.
Third, EPA could create an infrastructure that would enable its scientists
to serve as a clearinghouse for new technologies, particularly technologies
whose effects could cross traditional disciplinary boundaries. The goal of such
an infrastructure would be to foster diffusion and adaptation of new technolo-
gies, often the slowest step in the innovation process. Steps taken to enhance
diffusion could accelerate innovation.
Fourth, technologic innovation relies on willingness (laws and market
pressures), capacity, and opportunities for change (Ashford 2000). Capacity
becomes a large barrier to innovation adoption, particularly for small and me-
dium-size firms that may not have resources to implement or monitor change or
that have legitimate concerns about failed technology adoption. EPA has an im-
portant role in addressing capacity and opportunity through science and support
that provides information, technical assistance, networking of firms, demonstra-
tion activities, and economic incentives and disincentives (Ashford 2000). Many
capacity-support mechanisms work most effectively at a state level. Since the
passage of the Pollution Prevention Act of 1990, EPA has worked closely with
providers of the NIST Manufacturing Extension Partnership and state pollution-
prevention technical assistance providers to support innovative adoption of the
act. Such models as the Massachusetts Toxics Use Reduction Program provide
examples of how an agency like EPA can leverage resources to support innova-
tion. The focus of the program is not on identifying “acceptable” exposure levels
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