Madhu Khanna

I have worked on diverse topics ranging from technology adoption and agro-environmental policy analysis, voluntary approaches to environmental protection and the land use, market and greenhouse gas implications of biofuels. My work on technology adoption seeks to provide a rationale for the often-observed low rates of adoption of efficiency-enhancing technologies and shows the importance of considering heterogeneous producer characteristics, risks, uncertainty and market failures that distort prices while analyzing the incentives to adopt these technologies. I also examine the design of conservation payments to induce the adoption of improved land management practices to reduce non-point pollution from agriculture and enhance soil carbon sequestration.

My research also examines the effectiveness of environmental information disclosure policies and voluntary pollution control programs in achieving environmental protection.  I have studied the motivations for corporations to undertake voluntary environmental initiatives to reduce toxic emissions to the environment. I analyze the design of such voluntary programs, the incentives for firms to participate and the effectiveness of voluntary efforts in improving corporate environmental performance.

More recently, I have been conducting interdisciplinary research analyzing the economic and land use implications of large scale production of biofuels from the next-generation of bioenergy crops, such as perennial grasses and crop residues, and the intended and unintended impacts of biofuels on greenhouse gas emissions and water quality.