Can pecuniary and environmental incentives via SMS messaging make households adjust their electricity demand to a fluctuating production?
Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
The increasing deployment of renewables introduces substantial variability into the production of electricity, requiring demand to be more movable across time. We analyze data from a large Danish field experiment (2015-2016) to investigate whether households can be prompted, via SMS messages, to move electricity consumption, and if so, whether these are motivated by pecuniary or environmental motives. The analysis has two steps: As a novel approach, we first use automatic model selection, which allows a different time-series regression for each of the 1488 households studied. From this, we obtain a cross-section of estimated SMS effects, which we then regress on the motive type. Since households can opt out there is a risk of self-selection. We therefore control for the size, income and average consumption of the household, and the age, educational- and labor market status of the SMS recipient. The results suggest that SMS messages can to some extent motivate households to move consumption. Although a stronger financial motive seems more effective, mixing financial and environmental motives seems the most effective. Finally, women and elderly people are more inclined to move consumption.
Original language | English |
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Journal | Energy Economics |
Volume | 80 |
Pages (from-to) | 1050-1058 |
Number of pages | 9 |
ISSN | 0140-9883 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2019 |
ID: 213873113