Born to be green: new insights into the economics and management of green entrepreneurship

While the number of green start-ups has steadily increased around the world in response to the environmental problems demanding immediate solutions, there are several unresolved questions on the behaviour and performance of such ventures. The papers in this special issue shed light on these issues by underscoring the role of several factors, such as industry life cycles, knowledge spillovers, institutions, and availability of external finance, in shaping decision-making and firm behaviour in green start-ups. This paper highlights the state-of-the art developments in the literature, discusses the key contributions of the papers put together in this special issue and presents a future research agenda for scholars interested in green entrepreneurship

‘Better late than never’: the interplay between green technology and age for firm growth

This paper investigates the relationship between green/non-green technologies and firm growth. By combining the literature on eco-innovations, industrial organisation and entrepreneurial studies, we examine the dependence of this relationship on the pace at which firms grow and the age of the firm. From a dataset of 5498 manufacturing firms in Italy for the period of 2000–2008, longitudinal fixed effects quantile models are estimated, in which the firm’s age is set to moderate the effects of green and non-green patents on employment growth. We find that the positive effect of green technologies on growth is greater than that of non-green technologies. However, this result does not apply to struggling and rapidly growing firms. With fast-growing (above the median) firms, age moderates the growth effect of green technologies. Inconsistent with the extant literature, this moderation effect is positive: firm experience appears important for the growth benefits of green technologies, possibly relative to the complexity of their management

Heterocycle-substituted indenes as precursors for supported zirconocene catalysts

The indene ligands {1-C9H7R} [R = C2H4(C4H7O2) (1), C2H4(C3H5O2) (2), CH2(C5H9O) (3)] were prepared by alkylation of indene and used to prepare the SiMe2-bridged indenylcyclopentadiene ligands {Me2Si(3-C9H6R)(C5Me4H)}[R = C2H4(C4H7O2) (4), CH2(C5H9O) (5)]. Bis(indenyl)-and ansa-indenylcyclopentadienyl zirconocenes [Zr{1-η5-C9H6R}2Cl2] {R = C2H4(C4H7O2) (6), C2H4(C3H5O2) (7), CH2(C5H9O) (8)} and [Zr{Me2Si(3-η5-C9H5R)(η5-C5Me4)}Cl2] {R = C2H4(C4H7O2) (9), CH2(C5H9O) (10)} were prepared by the reaction of ZrCl4 with the appropriate mono- or dilithium salts of 1–5. The molecular structure of [Zr{Me2Si(3-η5-C9H5C2H4(C4H7O2))(η5-C5Me4)}Cl2] (9) was determined by single-crystal X-ray diffraction studies. Indenylzirconium complexes 6–10 were immobilized on thf-modified MgCl2, and these supported systems were used to polymerize ethylene in the presence of methylaluminoxane. The catalytic activity of these complexes in both homogeneous and supported polymerization reactions is discussed.We gratefully acknowledge financial support from the Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia, Spain (Grant No. CTQ2006-11845), and the Junta de Comunidades de Castilla-La Mancha (Grant No. PBI-05-029).Peer reviewe

A grafted methane partial oxidation catalyst from MoO2(acac)2 and HZSM-5 zeolite

A new methane partial oxidation (MPO) catalyst has been prepared by grafting MoO2(acac)2 (acac: acetylacetonate ligand) onto the surface of dried HZSM-5 zeolite. This reaction was performed in an organic solvent under an inert atmosphere with the exclusion of water from the reaction. It was shown by FT-IR spectroscopy that the reaction takes place between the acidic hydroxyl groups of the zeolite and the acetylacetonate ligands of the complex. After the grafting reaction, the solid was washed, dried and calcined in air, to afford the final [S]O2MoO2, Mo(VI), highly dispersed, surface species. The catalytic activity of this new material in the MPO reaction is enhanced in comparison with the classical Mo,W/HZSM-5 impregnation catalysts.A.A., F.C., J.F.B., F.J.F. and A.O. acknowledge financial support from DGES (Dirección General de Enseñanza Superior e Investigación Cientı́fica, Grant No. PB 95-0023-CO1-CO2) of Spain. P.C., A.L., L.R. and J.L.V. acknowledge financial support from DGES (Dirección General de Enseñanza Superior e Investigación Cientı́fica, Grant No. PB92-521) of Spain.Peer reviewe