The transition to a cleaner and more resilient economy requires an increased use of renewable energy. The global market for solar power has expanded dramatically over the last few decades. Now, as the market becomes mature, new niches need to be identified. One of these could be the use of ‘peer-to-peer solar’, which offers an opportunity for households who cannot have solar panels fixed to their own homes to access solar energy from their neighbours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The authors of this paper hypothesise that because using a neighbour’s solar power is an invisible <\/em>form of pro-environmental behaviour, it will mean less reward in the form of social or peer approval, reducing the attractiveness of peer-to-peer solar. They tested this by advertising peer-to-peer solar in two Massachusetts cities through Facebook, in partnership with a company that offered a randomly selected sub-sample of customers the possibility to share reports of their green behaviour online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The data confirm the hypothesis. Interest in peer-to-peer solar power increased by about 30% when ‘green reports’ were mentioned in the advertisements. However, in the case of more extensive Facebook campaigns, the algorithm started reaching out to an audience considered ‘less relevant’, and they were less responsive to the messaging. Therefore, the study also provides a methodological contribution on how to run field experiments through Facebook ads in the presence of a heterogeneous audience and an optimising algorithm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Peer-to-peer solar offers households who cannot have solar panels fixed to their own homes to access solar energy from their neighbours. But because this is an invisible form of pro-environmental behaviour, the rewards in the form of social approval are lower. This working paper finds that the ability to share reports of green behaviour online made people more likely to show interest in the scheme.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"author":57,"featured_media":62807,"template":"","tags":[4173,4177,4172,533,4171,1668,288],"publication-type":[435],"topic_area":[4698],"class_list":["post-62784","publication","type-publication","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-community-energy","tag-observability","tag-peer-to-peer-solar","tag-pro-environmental-behaviour","tag-solar-panels","tag-solar-power","tag-us","publication-type-working-papers","topic_area-behavioural-responses"],"acf":{"exclude_from_sync":{"ref_value":"field_560538b0e7350","value":"0","type":false,"post_type":""},"show_translations_widget":{"ref_value":"field_6203d588c41e8","value":"0","type":false,"post_type":""},"downloads":{"ref_value":"field_52f16cc1a80f2","value":["https:\/\/www.lse.ac.uk\/granthaminstitute\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/working-paper-383-Carattini-et-al..pdf"],"type":"download","post_type":""},"rss_newsletter":{"ref_value":"field_54f5c2c1544d8","value":"","type":false,"post_type":""},"profile_link":{"ref_value":"field_52f164b5189e9","value":["stefano-carattini","kenneth-gillingham","xiangyu-meng","erez-yoeli"],"type":"relationship","post_type":"profile"},"spotlight":{"ref_value":"field_52f80896506d3","value":"","type":false,"post_type":""}},"yoast_head":"\nKey points for decision-makers<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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