Authors
Daire McCoy, Raphaela Kotsch
Publication date
2018/11
Journal
Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy Working Paper
Volume
340
Description
The “energy-efficiency gap” is a topic that has received much attention in the academic literature. While the role of market and behavioural failures have been discussed at length, much less focus has been on quantifying the magnitude of heterogeneity and persistence that exists in the realised savings from installing measures. This paper fills a gap in the literature by providing new evidence on the persistence of savings over time for various measures and household types. Not only do households in more deprived areas experience lower energy savings, for certain measures the savings erode more quickly over time for these households. This result is important for improving our understanding of the incentives faced by households, for better evaluating the cost-effectiveness of public policies and raises new concerns over the how the costs and benefits of policies are distributed. It also suggests that the energy-efficiency gap requires less explanation than some would suggest.
Total citations
202020212022113