Behavior change of citizens to realize a decarbonized lifestyle

3^e séance de l’atelier 1 du Ladyss en partenaraiat avec le LIED (Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire sur les Energies de Demain Vendredi 16 décembre 2022 de 14h à 16h
Lieu : Salle 358 Olympes de Gouges (Université Paris Cité, site PRG, métro bibliothèque François Mitterrand)

Le Prof. Yoshiaki Ushifusa (Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, The University of Kitakyushu), présentera un article intitulé « Behavior change of citizens to realize a decarbonized lifestyle » (en anglais). A l’issue de sa présentation, nous discuterons ensemble de la question de la prise en compte du rôle des citoyens dans le processus de décarbonation et les formes alternatives d’organisations qu’ils contribuent à faire émerger.

Abstract

In order to realize a decarbonized society, not only companies but also households need to act. This study investigates the different impacts of monetary and nonmonetary incentives on energy-saving behaviors of households using a field experiment conducted in Japan. We find that the average reduction in electricity consumption from the rebate is 4%, whereas that from the nudge is not significantly different from zero. Applying a novel machine learning method for causal inference (causal forest) to estimate heterogeneous treatment effects at the household level, we demonstrate that the nudge intervention’s treatment effects generate greater heterogeneity among households. These findings suggest that selective targeting for treatment increases the policy efficiency of monetary and nonmonetary interventions.