Fraunhofer-Institut für System- und Innovationsforschung ISI

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  • Publication
    Adoption of retrofit measures among homeowners in EU countries: The effects of access to capital and debt aversion
    ( 2021)
    Schleich, Joachim orcid-logo
    ;
    Faure, Corinne
    ;
    Meissner, Thomas
    Energy efficiency policies often involve low-interest loans for retrofit measures in private buildings; the main target of these loans are meant to be households with otherwise poor access to capital. However, such programs can only be successful if the targeted households also take up these loans. This paper studies the relation between access to capital and debt aversion and the adoption of retrofit measures in European Union countries, employing a demographically representative household survey including about 6600 homeowners in France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Romania, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. The findings suggest that debt aversion negatively affects the adoption of retrofit measures by homeowners. In particular, debt-averse homeowners with poor access to capital are less likely to have adopted retrofit measures than non-debt-averse homeowners with poor access to capital. The findings further provide evidence that low-interest loan programs should be targeted at younger homeowners with lower income and less formal education.
  • Publication
    A large-scale test of the effects of time discounting, risk aversion, loss aversion and present bias on household adoption of energy-efficient technologies
    ( 2019)
    Schleich, Joachim orcid-logo
    ;
    Gassmann, Xavier
    ;
    Meissner, Thomas
    ;
    Faure, C.
    This paper empirically and jointly analyses the relations between risk aversion, standard time discounting, present bias, and loss aversion and household stated adoption of low to high stake energy efficiency technologies (EETs) (light emitting diodes (LEDs), energy efficient appliances, and retrofit measures). The analysis relies on a large representative sample drawn from eight European Union countries. Preferences over time, risk and losses were elicited and jointly estimated from participant choices in incentivized, context-free multiple price list experiments. The findings from econometrically estimating EET adoption equations suggest that present-biased individuals are less likely to adopt EETs. They also provide (weak) evidence that individuals which are more risk-averse, or more loss-averse, or which exhibit a lower discount factor are less likely to adopt EETs. Finally, omitting one or several of the time and risk or loss-aversion parameters when estimating the EET adoption equations did not appear to cause omitted variable bias.