Do consumers concern about energy saving in purchasing energy-efficient home appliances? Evidence from online e-commerce review

Home appliances are the most common products which contribute to the energy consumption and carbon emissions at individual level. Nudging public to adopt energy efficient home appliances is crucial in achieving carbon neutrality goal. Based on user-generated content (N = 156,109) from e-commerce platform and natural language processing-structural equation modeling technique, this paper investigates the factors that affecting usage intention of energy-saving home appliances. By extending the online-decision-making-model with energy saving, this paper found out that: (1) Energy saving is one of the major considerations when customers make purchasing decisions for energy-efficient appliances. (2): Consumers do not pay equal attention to energy efficiency in home appliances purchase (3): Perceived service benefits, perceived functional benefits, perceived price benefits, and brand trust positively impact the customers’ intention to purchase energy-efficient appliances. (4): Energy saving has significantly weaker impact on purchase intention for energy-efficient appliances in western regions. The findings of this study propose targeted policy recommendations to promote energy efficiency attribute in appliances sales, convey the long-term economic benefits of energy-efficient appliances to consumers, establish more stringent household energy management standards in western regions, and familiarize consumers with different energy-saving effects of various types of appliances.