Harnessing Policy Complementarities to Conserve Energy: Evidence from a Natural Field Experiment

John List, Robert Metcalfe (), Michael Price and Florian Rundhammer ()

No 23355, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: The literature has shown the power of social norms to promote residential energy conservation, particularly among high usage users. This study uses a natural field experiment with nearly 200,000 US households to explore whether a financial rewards program can complement such approaches. We observe strong impacts of the program, particularly amongst low-usage and low-variance households, customers who typically are less responsive to normative messaging. Our data thus suggest important policy complementarities between behavioral and financial incentives: whereas non-pecuniary interventions disproportionately affect intense users, financial incentives are able to substantially affect the low-user, “sticky households.”

JEL-codes: C93 D03 Q4 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ene, nep-exp and nep-reg
Note: EEE PE
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (23)

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Working Paper: Harnessing Policy Complementarities to Conserve Energy: Evidence from a Natural Field Experiment (2017)
Working Paper: Harnessing Policy Complementarities to Conserve Energy: Evidence from a Natural Field Experiment (2017)
Working Paper: Harnessing Policy Complementarities to Conserve Energy: Evidence from a Natural Field Experiment (2017)
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