Using Field Experiments to Understand Energy Efficiency
Paper Session
Saturday, Jan. 7, 2017 7:30 PM – 9:30 PM
Swissotel Chicago, Zurich F
- Chair: John A. List, University of Chicago
Information Frictions, Inertia, and Selection on Elasticity: A Field Experiment on Electricity Tariff Choice
Abstract
We develop a discrete-continuous choice model to characterize the link between plan choice, switching frictions, and subsequent continuous choice of service utilization. We then test the model predictions by using a randomized controlled trial in electricity tariff choice. We find that both information frictions and inertia prevent consumers from switching to a tariff that is privately and socially beneficial. While interventions to mitigate these frictions increased overall switching rates, they also incentivized relatively price-inelastic consumers to switch. We characterize this phenomenon by selection on elasticity and show how it affects the optimal rate design in the presence of switching frictions.Smart Thermostats and Social Norms: Distributional Evidence From a Field Experiment
Abstract
Over the past decade governments around the world have invested billions to support the development and installation of smart-grid technologies. We present evidence from a field experiment that considers a role for pro-social preferences in leveraging these investments via a smart thermostat with social norm framing of set point choices. To guide our investigation we develop a simple model that relates the household’s choice variable (temperature set point) to our observable (electricity use).We then consider the testable predictions of a smart thermostat affecting one of two margins—pro-social motivations or adjustment costs—and find that higher order moments can parse the two models. In particular, a smart thermostat increasing prosocial motivations predicts a reduction in the mean and standard deviation of electricity use, while a reduction in adjustment costs predicts an increase in the standard deviation. We find that treatment caused an approximate 2.3 percent reduction in average electricity use and a corresponding 5.6 to 7.5 percent reduction in the standard deviation of
electricity use, suggesting an important role for social incentives in smart technology. Counterfactual simulations of the wholesale electricity market in California point to meaningful savings from adoption of such technologies at scale, with changes in variance driving more than one-third of the savings.
Are Consumers Poorly Informed About Fuel Economy? Evidence From a Randomized Trial
Abstract
Energy efficiency standards, including automotive fuel economy standards, have been justified on the basis of large private welfare gains to consumers, on top of any gains from externality reduction. Two frequently-proposed reasons for why consumers currently leave these private gains on the table are that they are imperfectly informed about the benefits of fuel economy or that they are informed but inattentive to these benefits. We test these by implementing two potentially-powerful informational interventions with two different consumer populations. First, we carry out extensive informational discussions with randomly-selected consumers from car dealerships in several different locations across the country. Second, we recruit vehicle shoppers from a nationwide survey panel and treat them with videos and other information about fuel economy. Under the assumption that our treated groups are attentive and fully informed to fuel economy, we use our treatment effects to bound the allocative distortions from inattention and imperfect information.Discussant(s)
Dave Rapson
, University of California-Davis
Michael Price
, Georgia State University
Steven L. Puller
, Texas A&M University
Catherine Wolfram
, University of California-Berkeley
JEL Classifications
- D0 - General
- Q4 - Energy