scholarly journals Identifying Cost-Effective Residential Energy Efficiency Opportunities for the Kauai Island Utility Cooperative

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
S Busche ◽  
S Hockett
Keyword(s):  
Energy Efficiency ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
Residential Energy ◽  
Residential Energy Efficiency

Encouraging residential energy efficiency

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Energy Efficiency ◽  
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ◽  
Greenhouse Gas ◽  
Real World ◽  
Energy Savings ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
Effective Strategy ◽  
Residential Energy ◽  
Information Campaigns ◽  
Residential Energy Efficiency

Programs that encouraged investments in residential energy efficiency had limited returns in several impact evaluations in real-world settings. Relatively small impacts on energy savings coupled with low take-up meant that encouraging these investments through information campaigns and subsidies was not a cost-effective strategy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

scholarly journals Differential and Distributional Effects of Energy Efficiency Surveys: Evidence from Electricity Consumption

2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 375-406
Author(s):  
Thomas J. Kniesner ◽  
Galib Rustamov
Keyword(s):  
Energy Efficiency ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Carbon Dioxide Emissions ◽  
Energy Savings ◽  
Electricity Consumption ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
Residential Energy ◽  
Time Interaction ◽  
Residential Energy Efficiency ◽  
Evaluation Problem

Our research investigates the effects of residential energy efficiency audit programs on subsequent household electricity consumption. Here there is a one-time interaction between households, which participate voluntarily, and the surveyors. Our research objective is to determine whether and to what extent the surveys lead to behavioral changes. We then examine how persistent the intervention is over time and whether the effects decay or intensify. The main evaluation problem here is survey participants’ self-selection, which we address econometrically via several non-parametric estimators involving kernel-based propensity-score matching. In the first method we use difference-in-differences (DID) estimation. Our second estimator is quantile DID, which produces estimates on distributions. The comparison group consists of households who were not yet participating in the survey but participated later. Our evidence is that the customers who participated in the survey reduced their electricity consumption by about 7%, on average compared to customers who had not yet participated in the survey. Considering the total number of high-usage households participating in the survey in 2009, we estimate that electricity consumption was reduced by an aggregate of 2 million kWh per year, which is approximately equal to the monthly consumption of 3500 typical households in California with an estimated 1527 metric tons less of carbon dioxide emissions. Because the energy audit program is inexpensive ($10–$20 per household) a key issue is that while the program is cost-effective, is it regressive? We find that as the quantiles of the outcome distribution increase, high-use households save proportionally less electricity than do low-use customers. Overall, our results imply that program designers can better target low-use and low-income households, because they are more likely to benefit from the programs through energy savings.

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