We wondered a while back what was the point of the state selling off general tax credits at auction, to pay for energy projects. It would just shift money from the general tax pool and shift it over to "green" this and that -- why waste time with a tax credit auction? You could just as easily have just transferred the funds within the state budget.

A reader who's been following this exercise has picked up a report from the state bureaucrats on how the program "worked." The report is here. Apparently someone out there was willing to pay slightly over face value for the credits -- perhaps because the buyer could use them immediately against quarterly tax obligations, rather than waiting until his or her annual tax bill is due. But the state sold only $461,000 of the credits, when the original plan was for $1.1 million.

It's still hard to understand how anybody thought this was a good idea. But apparently, they'll do it again next year. And since a lot of credits went unsold this time, it seems likely that no one will be bidding more than face amount next time.