Structural and Financial Constraints Driving Residential Solar PV Adoption: Empirical Evidence from Austria

Ayse Tugba Atasoy and Reinhard Madlener
Additional contact information
Ayse Tugba Atasoy: Chair of Energy Economics and Management, Institute for Future Energy Consumer Needs and Behavior (FCN), E.ON Energy Research Center / School of Business and Economics, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany

No No. 5/2026, FCN Working Papers from E.ON Energy Research Center, Future Energy Consumer Needs and Behavior (FCN)

Abstract: Residential solar photovoltaic systems play a key role in decentralized energy transitions. Despite declining technology costs and growing policy support, household adoption remains uneven and below technical potential. This paper investigates whether PV adoption is pri- marily driven by preferences and motivations or constrained by structural and economic feasibility. Using a representative survey of Austrian households, we compare adopters and non-adopters by examining structural housing conditions, socio-economic characteristics and environmental attitudes, as well as the co-adoption of complementary technologies, comple- mented by evidence on perceived motivations and barriers. The results show that adoption is strongly associated with structural feasibility and technology co-adoption. Higher income, single-family housing, and ownership of heat pumps and electric vehicles significantly increase adoption likelihood, while the effect of homeownership becomes statistically insignificant once income and other socio-economic factors are controlled for. Environmental awareness does not significantly predict adoption once structural factors are taken into account. Reported barriers among non-adopters closely mirror these patterns: financial constraints, building limitations, and administrative hurdles dominate. Overall, the findings suggest that structural and financial constraints play a more prominent role than preference-based factors in shaping residential PV adoption, highlighting the importance of addressing feasibility barriers in policy design. Policies should therefore prioritize reducing structural and financial constraints, particularly for households in multi-family housing.

Keywords: Residential Solar Photovoltaics; Energy Policy; Household Adoption; Structural Barriers; Financial Constraints; Energy Transition; Austria (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D12 Q42 Q48 R20 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 21
Date: 2026-03-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ene
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.fcn.eonerc.rwth-aachen.de/global/show_ ... p?id=aaaaaaaadmvhgmr
https://www.fcn.eonerc.rwth-aachen.de/global/show_ ... p?id=aaaaaaaadmvhgmr

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ris:fcnwpa:022448

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in FCN Working Papers from E.ON Energy Research Center, Future Energy Consumer Needs and Behavior (FCN) Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Rahil dejkam ().