New research questions whether emissions can be reduced by smart home energy-saving goods
Do energy-saving goods reduce emissions? That’s one of the questions researchers set out to answer when they conducted a large-scale survey across 37 nations.
Since energy consumption became an important contributor to climate change owing to carbon emissions, energy-saving behavior and expenditure at the household level have been attracting scholars’ and policymakers’ attention. This study identified whether greenhouse gas emissions at the household level can be reduced through purchase of energy-saving goods and whether the energy-saving behavior enhanced with household income increase. We conducted a large-scale survey across 37 nations using internet-based and face-to-face approaches, collecting 100,956 observations. The wealth effect on energy consumption expenditure at the household level was found to be positive across countries, confirming that energy consumption increases with household wealth improvement. Furthermore, households show a positive association between household energy expenditure and life satisfaction in 27 out of 37 countries, including China, India, the United States, and Germany. Additionally, the favorable effects of household energy-saving behavior are confirmed. However, purchase of household energy-saving products has a limited effect on energy consumption expenditure, compared with that of energy-curtailment behavior. In conclusion, achieving a carbon–neutral household by reducing energy consumption expenditure at the household level is challenging; thus, along with the use of energy-saving goods, alternative energy sources, such as renewable energies, are recommended.
Surprisingly, purchasing energy-saving household products has a limited effect on reducing energy consumption expenditure at the household level. The coefficients for purchasing energy-saving household products are negative, ranging between -0.044 and -0.763, and are statistically significant in Australia, Canada, the Czech Republic, Italy, and Kazakhstan. Hence, the purchase of these products in these five countries decreases energy expenditure from 2.9% (China) to 14% (Australia). However, the relationship between energy consumption expenditure at the household level and purchasing energy-saving household products is non-significant in the other countries. Moreover, in Poland and Turkey, households that purchase these products consume more energy than those that do not. Therefore, purchasing energy-saving household products has a limited contribution to energy saving at the household level.
The findings also show that older individuals tend to have lower energy consumption. The coefficients for the age variable are negative and statistically significant in 30 countries (out of 37). The effect of age on energy consumption expenditure ranges between -0.003 and -0.148, indicating that as the average age of individuals increases by one year, their monthly energy consumption expenditure reduces from 0.3–14.8 USD. This may be because older individuals are more likely to live frugally.
