IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v13y2021i16p9028-d613107.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

An Empirical Approach to Differences in Flexible Electricity Consumption Behaviour of Urban and Rural Populations—Lessons Learned in Germany

Author

Listed:
  • Lucas Roth

    (Kelso-Professorship for Comparative Law, East European Economic Law and European Legal Policy, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics, European University Viadrina, Große Scharrnstrasse 59, 15230 Frankfurt, Germany)

  • Özgür Yildiz

    (Department of Environmental Economics and Economic Policy, Technische Universität Berlin, Str. des 17. Juni 135, 10623 Berlin, Germany
    Advyce GmbH, Brunnstraße 7, 80331 München, Germany)

  • Jens Lowitzsch

    (Kelso-Professorship for Comparative Law, East European Economic Law and European Legal Policy, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics, European University Viadrina, Große Scharrnstrasse 59, 15230 Frankfurt, Germany)

Abstract

This article analyses two major trends of the 21st century. Firstly, the transition from fossil fuel-based energy production to renewable energy sources. Secondly, the inexorable urbanisation which can be witnessed all over the globe. The most promising renewable energy production technologies for the near future, i.e., wind and solar energy, are volatile by nature which makes matching supply and demand essential for a successful transition. Therefore, the aspects that determine the willingness of consumers to flexibilise their demand has gained growing attention. Initial research shows that different settings for (co-)ownership in terms of available prosumption options and used production technologies have a varying impact on demand flexibility. However, existing research has analysed flexibility drivers solely for the general population as an aggregate without any distinction regarding spatial, economic, or social factors. In this article, the authors go one step further and analyse whether those drivers for flexible consumption behaviour differ in rural or urban areas acknowledging differences in day-to-day life in both cases. This study is based on 2074 completed questionnaires from German consumers which were analysed using propensity score matching. The results show that people from rural and urban areas do not significantly differ in their willingness to be demand flexible in general. However, (co-)owners of RE installations from rural areas are generally significantly more demand flexible than (co-)owners of RE installations from urban areas. Further, when looking at different RE technologies, the results show that (co-)owners of solar installations are significantly more demand flexible if they are from rural areas. Lastly, when looking at usage options, people who solely consume produced electricity are more demand flexible if they are from rural areas as well.

Suggested Citation

  • Lucas Roth & Özgür Yildiz & Jens Lowitzsch, 2021. "An Empirical Approach to Differences in Flexible Electricity Consumption Behaviour of Urban and Rural Populations—Lessons Learned in Germany," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(16), pages 1-31, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:16:p:9028-:d:613107
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/16/9028/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/16/9028/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Parra, David & Norman, Stuart A. & Walker, Gavin S. & Gillott, Mark, 2017. "Optimum community energy storage for renewable energy and demand load management," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 200(C), pages 358-369.
    2. Diebold, Francis X. & Chen, Celia, 1996. "Testing structural stability with endogenous breakpoint A size comparison of analytic and bootstrap procedures," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 70(1), pages 221-241, January.
    3. Poggi, Francesca & Firmino, Ana & Amado, Miguel, 2018. "Planning renewable energy in rural areas: Impacts on occupation and land use," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 155(C), pages 630-640.
    4. Belmonte, Silvina & Escalante, Karina Natalia & Franco, Judith, 2015. "Shaping changes through participatory processes: Local development and renewable energy in rural habitats," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 278-289.
    5. Wittmann, Nadine & Yildiz, Özgür, 2013. "A microeconomic analysis of decentralized small scale biomass based CHP plants—The case of Germany," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 123-129.
    6. Berry, David, 2010. "Delivering Energy Savings Through Community-Based Organizations," The Electricity Journal, Elsevier, vol. 23(9), pages 65-74, November.
    7. repec:cai:poeine:pope_1002_0285 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Stelmach, Greg & Zanocco, Chad & Flora, June & Rajagopal, Ram & Boudet, Hilary S., 2020. "Exploring household energy rules and activities during peak demand to better determine potential responsiveness to time-of-use pricing," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 144(C).
    9. Middlemiss, Lucie & Parrish, Bradley D., 2010. "Building capacity for low-carbon communities: The role of grassroots initiatives," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(12), pages 7559-7566, December.
    10. Jacobsson, Staffan & Johnson, Anna, 2000. "The diffusion of renewable energy technology: an analytical framework and key issues for research," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 28(9), pages 625-640, July.
    11. Bauwens, Thomas & Eyre, Nick, 2017. "Exploring the links between community-based governance and sustainable energy use: Quantitative evidence from Flanders," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 163-172.
    12. Hall, Peter & Horowitz, Joel L, 1996. "Bootstrap Critical Values for Tests Based on Generalized-Method-of-Moments Estimators," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 64(4), pages 891-916, July.
    13. Fadly, Dalia & Fontes, Francisco, 2019. "Geographical proximity and renewable energy diffusion: An empirical approach," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 129(C), pages 422-435.
    14. Szarka, Nora & Scholwin, Frank & Trommler, Marcus & Fabian Jacobi, H. & Eichhorn, Marcus & Ortwein, Andreas & Thrän, Daniela, 2013. "A novel role for bioenergy: A flexible, demand-oriented power supply," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 18-26.
    15. Sara Torabi Moghadam & Maria Valentina Di Nicoli & Santiago Manzo & Patrizia Lombardi, 2020. "Mainstreaming Energy Communities in the Transition to a Low-Carbon Future: A Methodological Approach," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(7), pages 1-25, April.
    16. Fei Wang & Liming Liu & Yili Yu & Gang Li & Jessica Li & Miadreza Shafie-khah & João P. S. Catalão, 2018. "Impact Analysis of Customized Feedback Interventions on Residential Electricity Load Consumption Behavior for Demand Response," Energies, MDPI, vol. 11(4), pages 1-22, March.
    17. Kubli, Merla & Loock, Moritz & Wüstenhagen, Rolf, 2018. "The flexible prosumer: Measuring the willingness to co-create distributed flexibility," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 540-548.
    18. Xiao Han & Chu Wei, 2021. "Household energy consumption: state of the art, research gaps, and future prospects," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 23(8), pages 12479-12504, August.
    19. Lucas Roth & Jens Lowitzsch & Özgür Yildiz, 2021. "An Empirical Study of How Household Energy Consumption Is Affected by Co-Owning Different Technological Means to Produce Renewable Energy and the Production Purpose," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(13), pages 1-38, July.
    20. Karolina Mucha-Kuś & Maciej Sołtysik & Krzysztof Zamasz & Katarzyna Szczepańska-Woszczyna, 2021. "Coopetitive Nature of Energy Communities—The Energy Transition Context," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(4), pages 1-13, February.
    21. Heiskanen, Eva & Johnson, Mikael & Robinson, Simon & Vadovics, Edina & Saastamoinen, Mika, 2010. "Low-carbon communities as a context for individual behavioural change," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(12), pages 7586-7595, December.
    22. Saskia Lavrijssen & Arturo Carrillo Parra, 2017. "Radical Prosumer Innovations in the Electricity Sector and the Impact on Prosumer Regulation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(7), pages 1-21, July.
    23. Hugo Lucas & Ruth Carbajo & Tomoo Machiba & Evgeny Zhukov & Luisa F. Cabeza, 2021. "Improving Public Attitude towards Renewable Energy," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(15), pages 1-16, July.
    24. Séverine Saintier, 2017. "Community Energy Companies in the UK: A Potential Model for Sustainable Development in “Local” Energy?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(8), pages 1-18, July.
    25. Nilsson, Anders & Lazarevic, David & Brandt, Nils & Kordas, Olga, 2018. "Household responsiveness to residential demand response strategies: Results and policy implications from a Swedish field study," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 273-286.
    26. Jay Sterling Gregg & Sophie Nyborg & Meiken Hansen & Valeria Jana Schwanitz & August Wierling & Jan Pedro Zeiss & Sarah Delvaux & Victor Saenz & Lucia Polo-Alvarez & Chiara Candelise & Winston Gilcrea, 2020. "Collective Action and Social Innovation in the Energy Sector: A Mobilization Model Perspective," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(3), pages 1-24, February.
    27. Malcolm J Beynon & Andrew Crawley & Max Munday, 2016. "Measuring and understanding the differences between urban and rural areas," Environment and Planning B, , vol. 43(6), pages 1136-1154, November.
    28. Yildiz, Özgür, 2014. "Financing renewable energy infrastructures via financial citizen participation – The case of Germany," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 677-685.
    29. Brummer, Vasco, 2018. "Community energy – benefits and barriers: A comparative literature review of Community Energy in the UK, Germany and the USA, the benefits it provides for society and the barriers it faces," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 187-196.
    30. Bauwens, Thomas, 2016. "Explaining the diversity of motivations behind community renewable energy," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 278-290.
    31. Guo, Peiyang & Li, Victor O.K. & Lam, Jacqueline C.K., 2017. "Smart demand response in China: Challenges and drivers," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 1-10.
    32. Schreiber, Michael & Wainstein, Martin E. & Hochloff, Patrick & Dargaville, Roger, 2015. "Flexible electricity tariffs: Power and energy price signals designed for a smarter grid," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 93(P2), pages 2568-2581.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lucas Roth & Jens Lowitzsch & Özgür Yildiz, 2021. "An Empirical Study of How Household Energy Consumption Is Affected by Co-Owning Different Technological Means to Produce Renewable Energy and the Production Purpose," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(13), pages 1-38, July.
    2. Lanka Horstink & Julia M. Wittmayer & Kiat Ng & Guilherme Pontes Luz & Esther Marín-González & Swantje Gährs & Inês Campos & Lars Holstenkamp & Sem Oxenaar & Donal Brown, 2020. "Collective Renewable Energy Prosumers and the Promises of the Energy Union: Taking Stock," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(2), pages 1-30, January.
    3. Dalia Streimikiene & Tomas Baležentis & Artiom Volkov & Mangirdas Morkūnas & Agnė Žičkienė & Justas Streimikis, 2021. "Barriers and Drivers of Renewable Energy Penetration in Rural Areas," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(20), pages 1-28, October.
    4. Brummer, Vasco, 2018. "Community energy – benefits and barriers: A comparative literature review of Community Energy in the UK, Germany and the USA, the benefits it provides for society and the barriers it faces," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 187-196.
    5. Conradie, Peter D. & De Ruyck, Olivia & Saldien, Jelle & Ponnet, Koen, 2021. "Who wants to join a renewable energy community in Flanders? Applying an extended model of Theory of Planned Behaviour to understand intent to participate," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    6. Roth, Lucas & Lowitzsch, Jens & Yildiz, Özgür, 2023. "Which (co-)ownership types in renewables are associated with the willingness to adopt energy-efficient technologies and energy-conscious behaviour? Data from German households," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 180(C).
    7. Bauwens, Thomas, 2019. "Analyzing the determinants of the size of investments by community renewable energy members: Findings and policy implications from Flanders," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 129(C), pages 841-852.
    8. Beate Fischer & Gunnar Gutsche & Heike Wetzel, 2020. "Who wants to get involved? Determinants of citizens’ willingness to participate in German renewable energy cooperatives," MAGKS Papers on Economics 202027, Philipps-Universität Marburg, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics, Department of Economics (Volkswirtschaftliche Abteilung).
    9. Horstink, Lanka & Wittmayer, Julia M. & Ng, Kiat, 2021. "Pluralising the European energy landscape: Collective renewable energy prosumers and the EU's clean energy vision," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 153(C).
    10. Cohen, Jed J. & Azarova, Valeriya & Kollmann, Andrea & Reichl, Johannes, 2021. "Preferences for community renewable energy investments in Europe," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(C).
    11. Vernay, Anne-Lorène & Sebi, Carine & Arroyo, Fabrice, 2023. "Energy community business models and their impact on the energy transition: Lessons learnt from France," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 175(C).
    12. Romero-Castro, Noelia & Piñeiro-Chousa, Juan & Pérez-Pico, Ada, 2021. "Dealing with heterogeneity and complexity in the analysis of the willingness to invest in community renewable energy in rural areas," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 173(C).
    13. F.G. Reis, Inês & Gonçalves, Ivo & A.R. Lopes, Marta & Henggeler Antunes, Carlos, 2021. "Business models for energy communities: A review of key issues and trends," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 144(C).
    14. Florian Hanke & Jens Lowitzsch, 2020. "Empowering Vulnerable Consumers to Join Renewable Energy Communities—Towards an Inclusive Design of the Clean Energy Package," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(7), pages 1-27, April.
    15. Taghikhah, Firouzeh Rosa & Taghikhah, Masoud & Marshall, Jonathan Paul & Voinov, Alexey, 2024. "Navigating the community renewable energy landscape: An analytics-driven policy formulation," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 362(C).
    16. Ebers Broughel, Anna & Hampl, Nina, 2018. "Community financing of renewable energy projects in Austria and Switzerland: Profiles of potential investors," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 722-736.
    17. Menyeh, Bridget Okyerebea, 2021. "Financing electricity access in Africa: A choice experiment study of household investor preferences for renewable energy investments in Ghana," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    18. Vernay, Anne-Lorène & Sebi, Carine, 2020. "Energy communities and their ecosystems: A comparison of France and the Netherlands," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    19. Bardsley, Nicholas & Büchs, Milena & James, Patrick & Papafragkou, Anastasios & Rushby, Thomas & Saunders, Clare & Smith, Graham & Wallbridge, Rebecca & Woodman, Nicholas, 2019. "Domestic thermal upgrades, community action and energy saving: A three-year experimental study of prosperous households," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 475-485.
    20. Jiang, Ping & Chen, Yihui & Xu, Bin & Dong, Wenbo & Kennedy, Erin, 2013. "Building low carbon communities in China: The role of individual’s behaviour change and engagement," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 611-620.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:16:p:9028-:d:613107. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.