IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/enepol/v128y2019icp607-615.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The effect of house energy efficiency programs on the extensive and intensive margin of lower-income households’ investment behavior

Author

Listed:
  • Drivas, Kyriakos
  • Rozakis, Stelios
  • Xesfingi, Sofia

Abstract

This paper examines the biggest house energy efficiency retrofit support program in Greece which ran during 2011–2015 and approximately fifty thousand households participated. We take advantage of an exogenous policy change resulting in cost reduction for households that occurred while the program was running. This change substantially increased the subsidy rate for lower-income households. We find that this effective cost reduction increased the participation rate (extensive margin). We add to the literature on retrofits by further showing that this change increased substantially the investment amount (intensive margin) of these lower-income households. Detailed data on a sub-sample of households reveal that this increase was driven primarily by window replacement and thermal insulation investments.

Suggested Citation

  • Drivas, Kyriakos & Rozakis, Stelios & Xesfingi, Sofia, 2019. "The effect of house energy efficiency programs on the extensive and intensive margin of lower-income households’ investment behavior," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 607-615.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:enepol:v:128:y:2019:i:c:p:607-615
    DOI: 10.1016/j.enpol.2019.01.040
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421519300680
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.enpol.2019.01.040?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nair, Gireesh & Gustavsson, Leif & Mahapatra, Krushna, 2010. "Factors influencing energy efficiency investments in existing Swedish residential buildings," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(6), pages 2956-2963, June.
    2. Card, David & Krueger, Alan B, 1994. "Minimum Wages and Employment: A Case Study of the Fast-Food Industry in New Jersey and Pennsylvania," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(4), pages 772-793, September.
    3. Meredith Fowlie & Michael Greenstone & Catherine Wolfram, 2015. "Are the Non-monetary Costs of Energy Efficiency Investments Large? Understanding Low Take-Up of a Free Energy Efficiency Program," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(5), pages 201-204, May.
    4. Georgia Makridou, Kostas Andriosopoulos, Michael Doumpos, and Constantin Zopounidis, 2015. "A Two-stage approach for energy efficiency analysis in European Union countries," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 2).
    5. Richard Blundell & Antoine Bozio & Guy Laroque, 2013. "Extensive and Intensive Margins of Labour Supply: Work and Working Hours in the US, the UK and France," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 34(1), pages 1-29, March.
    6. Peter Grosche & Colin Vance, 2009. "Willingness to Pay for Energy Conservation and Free-Ridership on Subsidization: Evidence from Germany," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 2), pages 135-154.
    7. Trotta, Gianluca, 2018. "Factors affecting energy-saving behaviours and energy efficiency investments in British households," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 529-539.
    8. Erdal Aydin & Nils Kok & Dirk Brounen, 2017. "Energy efficiency and household behavior: the rebound effect in the residential sector," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 48(3), pages 749-782, August.
    9. Paul L. Joskow & Donald B. Marron, 1992. "What Does a Negawatt Really Cost? Evidence from Utility Conservation Programs," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 4), pages 41-74.
    10. Marie-Laure Nauleau, 2014. "Free-Riding in Tax Credits For Home Insulation in France: An Econometric Assessment Using Panel Data," Working Papers 2014.26, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    11. A. Greening, Lorna & Greene, David L. & Difiglio, Carmen, 2000. "Energy efficiency and consumption -- the rebound effect -- a survey," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 28(6-7), pages 389-401, June.
    12. Milne, Geoffrey & Boardman, Brenda, 2000. "Making cold homes warmer: the effect of energy efficiency improvements in low-income homes A report to the Energy Action Grants Agency Charitable Trust," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 28(6-7), pages 411-424, June.
    13. Gibson, Heather D. & Hall, Stephen G. & Tavlas, George S., 2012. "The Greek financial crisis: Growing imbalances and sovereign spreads," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 31(3), pages 498-516.
    14. Papada, Lefkothea & Kaliampakos, Dimitris, 2016. "Measuring energy poverty in Greece," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 157-165.
    15. Geller, Howard & Harrington, Philip & Rosenfeld, Arthur H. & Tanishima, Satoshi & Unander, Fridtjof, 2006. "Polices for increasing energy efficiency: Thirty years of experience in OECD countries," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(5), pages 556-573, March.
    16. Meredith Fowlie & Michael Greenstone & Catherine Wolfram, 2018. "Do Energy Efficiency Investments Deliver? Evidence from the Weatherization Assistance Program," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(3), pages 1597-1644.
    17. Marianne Bertrand & Esther Duflo & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2004. "How Much Should We Trust Differences-In-Differences Estimates?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 119(1), pages 249-275.
    18. Banfi, Silvia & Farsi, Mehdi & Filippini, Massimo & Jakob, Martin, 2008. "Willingness to pay for energy-saving measures in residential buildings," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(2), pages 503-516, March.
    19. Kampas, Athanasios & Petsakos, Athanasios & Rozakis, Stelios, 2012. "Price induced irrigation water saving: Unraveling conflicts and synergies between European agricultural and water policies for a Greek Water District," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 28-38.
    20. Young, Denise, 2008. "Who pays for the `beer fridge' Evidence from Canada," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 553-560, February.
    21. Bird, Stephen & Hernández, Diana, 2012. "Policy options for the split incentive: Increasing energy efficiency for low-income renters," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 506-514.
    22. Kenneth Gillingham & Richard G. Newell & Karen Palmer, 2009. "Energy Efficiency Economics and Policy," Annual Review of Resource Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 1(1), pages 597-620, September.
    23. Tsoutsos, Theocharis & Drandaki, Maria & Frantzeskaki, Niki & Iosifidis, Eleftherios & Kiosses, Ioannis, 2009. "Sustainable energy planning by using multi-criteria analysis application in the island of Crete," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(5), pages 1587-1600, May.
    24. Mills, Bradford & Schleich, Joachim, 2012. "Residential energy-efficient technology adoption, energy conservation, knowledge, and attitudes: An analysis of European countries," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 616-628.
    25. Rapanos, Vassilis T. & Polemis, Michael L., 2006. "The structure of residential energy demand in Greece," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(17), pages 3137-3143, November.
    26. Nauleau, Marie‐Laure, 2014. "Free‐Riding in Tax Credits For Home Insulation in France: An Econometric Assessment Using Panel Data," Energy: Resources and Markets 165796, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM).
    27. Webber, Phil & Gouldson, Andy & Kerr, Niall, 2015. "The impacts of household retrofit and domestic energy efficiency schemes: A large scale, ex post evaluation," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 35-43.
    28. Braun, Frauke G., 2010. "Determinants of households' space heating type: A discrete choice analysis for German households," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(10), pages 5493-5503, October.
    29. Kwak, So-Yoon & Yoo, Seung-Hoon & Kwak, Seung-Jun, 2010. "Valuing energy-saving measures in residential buildings: A choice experiment study," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 673-677, January.
    30. Howden-Chapman, Philippa & Viggers, Helen & Chapman, Ralph & O’Sullivan, Kimberley & Telfar Barnard, Lucy & Lloyd, Bob, 2012. "Tackling cold housing and fuel poverty in New Zealand: A review of policies, research, and health impacts," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 134-142.
    31. Thomson, Hilary & Thomas, Sian, 2015. "Developing empirically supported theories of change for housing investment and health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 205-214.
    32. Filippini, Massimo & Hunt, Lester C. & Zorić, Jelena, 2014. "Impact of energy policy instruments on the estimated level of underlying energy efficiency in the EU residential sector," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 73-81.
    33. Nauleau, Marie-Laure, 2014. "Free-riding on tax credits for home insulation in France: An econometric assessment using panel data," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 78-92.
    34. Marie-Laure Nauleau, 2014. "Free-riding on tax credits for home insulation in France: An econometric assessment using panel data," Post-Print hal-01083206, HAL.
    35. Bruce A. Babcock, 2015. "Extensive and Intensive Agricultural Supply Response," Annual Review of Resource Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 7(1), pages 333-348, October.
    36. Chitnis, Mona & Sorrell, Steve & Druckman, Angela & Firth, Steven K. & Jackson, Tim, 2014. "Who rebounds most? Estimating direct and indirect rebound effects for different UK socioeconomic groups," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 12-32.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Proskuryakova, Liliana & Starodubtseva, Alena & Bianco, Vincenzo, 2020. "Modelling a household tariff for reducing sectoral cross-subsidies in the Russian power market," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 213(C).
    2. Shimada, Hideki & Honda, Tomonori, 2022. "What drives households’ choices of residential solar photovoltaic capacity?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 168(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Drivas, Kyriakos & Rozakis, Stelios & Xesfingi, Sofia, 2018. "The Effect of House Energy Efficiency Costs on the Participation Rate and Investment Amount of Lower-Income Households," MPRA Paper 86590, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Schleich, Joachim & Faure, Corinne & Meissner, Thomas, 2021. "Adoption of retrofit measures among homeowners in EU countries: The effects of access to capital and debt aversion," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 149(C).
    3. Charlier, Dorothée, 2015. "Energy efficiency investments in the context of split incentives among French households," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 465-479.
    4. Gilbert, Ben & LaRiviere, Jacob & Novan, Kevin, 2022. "Uncertainty and additionality in energy efficiency programs," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 115(C).
    5. Giraudet, Louis-Gaëtan, 2020. "Energy efficiency as a credence good: A review of informational barriers to energy savings in the building sector," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    6. Ce Huang & Jiefang Ma & Kun Song, 2021. "Homeowners’ Willingness to Make Investment in Energy Efficiency Retrofit of Residential Buildings in China and Its Influencing Factors," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(5), pages 1-17, February.
    7. Henningsen, Geraldine & Wiese, Catharina, 2019. "Do Household Characteristics Really Matter? A Meta-Analysis on the Determinants of Households’ Energy-Efficiency Investments," MPRA Paper 101701, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Collins, Matthew & Curtis, John, 2018. "Willingness-to-pay and free-riding in a national energy efficiency retrofit grant scheme," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 211-220.
    9. Giraudet, Louis-Gaëtan & Bourgeois, Cyril & Quirion, Philippe, 2021. "Policies for low-carbon and affordable home heating: A French outlook," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    10. Singhal, Puja & Pahle, Michael & Kalkuhl, Matthias & Levesque, Antoine & Sommer, Stephan & Berneiser, Jessica, 2022. "Beyond good faith: Why evidence-based policy is necessary to decarbonize buildings cost-effectively in Germany," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    11. Bourgeois, Cyril & Giraudet, Louis-Gaëtan & Quirion, Philippe, 2021. "Lump-sum vs. energy-efficiency subsidy recycling of carbon tax revenue in the residential sector: A French assessment," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 184(C).
    12. Olsthoorn, Mark & Schleich, Joachim & Gassmann, Xavier & Faure, Corinne, 2017. "Free riding and rebates for residential energy efficiency upgrades: A multi-country contingent valuation experiment," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(S1), pages 33-44.
    13. Collins, Matthew & Curtis, John, 2016. "Willingness-to-Pay and Free-Riding in a National Energy Efficiency Retrofit Grant Scheme: A Revealed Preference Approach," Papers WP551, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    14. Ó Broin, Eoin & Nässén, Jonas & Johnsson, Filip, 2015. "Energy efficiency policies for space heating in EU countries: A panel data analysis for the period 1990–2010," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 150(C), pages 211-223.
    15. Peñasco, Cristina & Anadón, Laura Díaz, 2023. "Assessing the effectiveness of energy efficiency measures in the residential sector gas consumption through dynamic treatment effects: Evidence from England and Wales," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C).
    16. Collins, Matthew & Curtis, John, 2017. "Identification of the information gap in residential energy efficiency: How information asymmetry can be mitigated to induce energy efficiency renovations," Papers WP558, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    17. Marie-Laure Nauleau & Louis-Gaëtan Giraudet & Philippe Quirion, 2015. "Energy Efficiency Policy with Price-quality Discrimination," Working Papers 2015.33, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    18. Jovović, Ivana & Cirman, Andreja & Hrovatin, Nevenka & Zorić, Jelena, 2023. "Do social capital and housing-related lifestyle foster energy-efficient retrofits? Retrospective panel data evidence from Slovenia," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 179(C).
    19. Eoin Ó Broin & Jonas Nässén & Filip Johnsson, 2015. "Energy efficiency policies for space heating in EU countries: A panel data analysis for the period 1990–2010," Post-Print hal-01205485, HAL.
    20. Bettina Chlond & Claire Gavard & Lisa Jeuck, 2023. "How to Support Residential Energy Conservation Cost-Effectively? An analysis of Public Financial Schemes in France," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 85(1), pages 29-63, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Q40; Q48; R20; Energy efficiency retrofits; Subsidy; Exogenous change; Extensive and intensive margin; Household investment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Q40 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy - - - General
    • Q48 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy - - - Government Policy
    • R20 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:enepol:v:128:y:2019:i:c:p:607-615. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/enpol .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.