Peer-to-peer solar and social rewards: evidence from a field experiment

Stefano Carattini, Kenneth Gillingham, Xiangyu Meng and Erez Yoeli

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: Observability and social rewards have been demonstrated to influence the adoption of pro-social behavior in a variety of contexts. This study implements a field experiment to examine the influence of observability and social rewards in the context of a novel pro-social behavior: peer-to-peer solar. Peer-to-peer solar offers an opportunity to households who cannot have solar on their homes to access solar energy from their neighbors. However, unlike solar installations, peer-to-peer solar is an invisible form of pro-environmental behavior. We implemented a set of randomized campaigns using Facebook ads in the Massachusetts cities of Cambridge and Somerville, in partnership with a peer-to-peer company, which agreed to offer to a subsample of customers the possibility to share “green reports” online, providing shareable information about their greenness. We find that interest in peer-to-peer solar increases by up to 30% when “green reports,” which would make otherwise invisible behavior visible, are mentioned in the ads

Keywords: Peer to peer solar; pro-environmental behavior; social rewards; visibility; Facebook (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C93 D91 Q20 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 61 pages
Date: 2022-11-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ene, nep-env, nep-exp, nep-net, nep-pay and nep-ure
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Downloads: (external link)
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/117361/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Peer-to-peer solar and social rewards: Evidence from a field experiment (2024)
Working Paper: Peer-to-peer solar and social rewards: Evidence from a field experiment (2024)
Working Paper: Peer-to-Peer Solar and Social Rewards: Evidence from a Field Experiment (2022)
Working Paper: Peer-to-peer solar and social rewards: evidence from a field experiment (2022)
Working Paper: Peer-to-peer solar and social rewards: Evidence from a field experiment (2022)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:117361

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