Understanding Residential Rooftop Solar Adoption for Policymakers

• In Event: Subnational Issues in Environmental Policy

Abstract

Distributed energy resources, particularly solar energy systems, are a growing part of the energy mix worldwide. This growth is expected to continue if the world is to continue to transition away from fossil fuels. In fact, as siting for utility scale facilities and transmission lines becomes increasingly difficult, it is possible that residential scale electricity generation will need to take on an even more substantial role than it has already.

In this context, the adoption of residential/rooftop solar technology by low and middle income households has lagged behind higher income groups, even though these households are most likely to benefit from this technology (Kwan, 2012). Thus, an improved understanding of the factors that predict such adoption can help policymakers implement solar adoption policy more effectively. We analyze residential solar adoption patterns using surveys to assess individual factors that might accelerate adoption in the future, and to achieve a deeper understanding of the political, economic, social, and psychological factors underlying the adoption of solar technology, which are currently under-researched. The ultimate aim of this work is to apply our understanding of solar adoption predictors to help policymakers understand the factors that drive the expansion of solar and other renewable energy sources. To this aim, we bridge the fields of political science, economics, psychology, and public policy analysis.

Our study focuses solely on New York State as a test bed to control for differentiation in policies adopted by different states. New York is characterized by its unique statewide renewable adoption incentives as well as differentiated local approaches. We survey homeowners in New York State regarding their attitudes towards solar and other energy sources, and specifically focusing on the role of solar incentive programs in adoption decisions. We use a statistically robust and representative sample of respondents from across New York State. Importantly, our survey work focuses on both 1) solar adopters (n=441) and 2) solar non-adopters (n=438) to gain a rich understanding of factors that drive adoption.

Our work examines and combines local incentive policies, socio-demographic factors, household circumstances (renter / lease), community characteristics, political beliefs, and a variety of personality variables that measure pro-environmental views, self-determination measures, and others. In particular our work helps to untangle differing drivers such as ideological and political beliefs from economic status, or pro-environmental beliefs. Further, this work is the only survey work we are aware of that surveys both adopters and non-adopters to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the factors that drive adoption.

Author

• Stephen Bird, Clarkson University