IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/enreec/v84y2023i1d10.1007_s10640-022-00721-x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Heterogeneity in the Rebound Effect: Evidence from Efficient Lighting Subsidies

Author

Listed:
  • Ensieh Shojaeddini

    (USGS)

  • Ben Gilbert

    (Colorado School of Mines)

Abstract

This paper quantifies heterogeneity in rebound effects from policy-induced energy efficiency improvements by income and home size. We do so in a relatively understudied context: residential lighting. This context allows us to separately estimate effects for energy services (lighting hours) and electricity consumption. We identify the effect of household-level subsidy uptake using instrumental variables for program awareness. We find that rebound effects are larger for low-income households and those in smaller homes. We also show that the rebound effect is not large enough to “backfire” and all income and home-size subsamples exhibit net energy savings.

Suggested Citation

  • Ensieh Shojaeddini & Ben Gilbert, 2023. "Heterogeneity in the Rebound Effect: Evidence from Efficient Lighting Subsidies," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 84(1), pages 173-217, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:enreec:v:84:y:2023:i:1:d:10.1007_s10640-022-00721-x
    DOI: 10.1007/s10640-022-00721-x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10640-022-00721-x
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10640-022-00721-x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Joshua Linn, 2016. "The Rebound Effect for Passenger Vehicles," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 2).
    2. Schleich, Joachim & Mills, Bradford & Dütschke, Elisabeth, 2014. "A brighter future? Quantifying the rebound effect in energy efficient lighting," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 35-42.
    3. Mills, Bradford & Schleich, Joachim, 2014. "Household transitions to energy efficient lighting," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 151-160.
    4. Hunt Allcott & Dmitry Taubinsky, 2015. "Evaluating Behaviorally Motivated Policy: Experimental Evidence from the Lightbulb Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(8), pages 2501-2538, August.
    5. Meredith Fowlie & Michael Greenstone & Catherine Wolfram, 2015. "Are the Non-monetary Costs of Energy Efficiency Investments Large? Understanding Low Take-Up of a Free Energy Efficiency Program," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(5), pages 201-204, May.
    6. Robert W. Hahn & Robert D. Metcalfe, 2021. "Efficiency and Equity Impacts of Energy Subsidies," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(5), pages 1658-1688, May.
    7. Roger Fouquet & Peter J.G. Pearson, 2012. "The Long Run Demand for Lighting:Elasticities and Rebound Effects in Different Phases of Economic Development," Economics of Energy & Environmental Policy, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 1).
    8. Alberini, Anna & Towe, Charles, 2015. "Information v. energy efficiency incentives: Evidence from residential electricity consumption in Maryland," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(S1), pages 30-40.
    9. Murray, Anthony G. & Mills, Bradford F., 2011. "Read the label! Energy Star appliance label awareness and uptake among U.S. consumers," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(6), pages 1103-1110.
    10. Sanderson, Eleanor & Windmeijer, Frank, 2016. "A weak instrument F-test in linear IV models with multiple endogenous variables," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 190(2), pages 212-221.
    11. repec:hal:gemwpa:hal-00991732 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Mills, Bradford F. & Schleich, Joachim, 2010. "Why don't households see the light?: Explaining the diffusion of compact fluorescent lamps," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 363-378, August.
    13. Stefano Iacus & Gary King & Giuseppe Porro, 2008. "Matching for Causal Inference Without Balance Checking," UNIMI - Research Papers in Economics, Business, and Statistics unimi-1073, Universitá degli Studi di Milano.
    14. Kenneth Gillingham & Matthew J. Kotchen & David S. Rapson & Gernot Wagner, 2013. "The rebound effect is overplayed," Nature, Nature, vol. 493(7433), pages 475-476, January.
    15. Hunt Allcott & Michael Greenstone, 2012. "Is There an Energy Efficiency Gap?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 26(1), pages 3-28, Winter.
    16. Su, Qing, 2012. "A quantile regression analysis of the rebound effect: Evidence from the 2009 National Household Transportation Survey in the United States," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 368-377.
    17. Joshua Graff Zivin & Kevin Novan, 2016. "Upgrading Efficiency and Behavior: Electricity Savings from Residential Weatherization Programs," The Energy Journal, , vol. 37(4), pages 1-24, October.
    18. Matthew Blackwell & Stefano Iacus & Gary King & Giuseppe Porro, 2009. "cem: Coarsened exact matching in Stata," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 9(4), pages 524-546, December.
    19. Si, Shuyang & Lyu, Mingjie & Lin Lawell, C.-Y. Cynthia & Chen, Song, 2018. "The effects of energy-related policies on energy consumption in China," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 202-227.
    20. Wall, Rob & Crosbie, Tracey, 2009. "Potential for reducing electricity demand for lighting in households: An exploratory socio-technical study," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 1021-1031, March.
    21. Steffen Andersen & John Y. Campbell & Kasper Meisner Nielsen & Tarun Ramadorai, 2020. "Sources of Inaction in Household Finance: Evidence from the Danish Mortgage Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 110(10), pages 3184-3230, October.
    22. Frondel, Manuel & Ritter, Nolan & Vance, Colin, 2012. "Heterogeneity in the rebound effect: Further evidence for Germany," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 461-467.
    23. Koichiro Ito, 2014. "Do Consumers Respond to Marginal or Average Price? Evidence from Nonlinear Electricity Pricing," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(2), pages 537-563, February.
    24. Milne, Geoffrey & Boardman, Brenda, 2000. "Making cold homes warmer: the effect of energy efficiency improvements in low-income homes A report to the Energy Action Grants Agency Charitable Trust," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 28(6-7), pages 411-424, June.
    25. Severin Borenstein & Lucas W. Davis, 2016. "The Distributional Effects of US Clean Energy Tax Credits," Tax Policy and the Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 30(1), pages 191-234.
    26. Ben Gilbert & Jacob LaRiviere & Kevin Novan, 2019. "Additionality, Mistakes, and Energy Efficiency Investment," Working Papers 2019-01, Colorado School of Mines, Division of Economics and Business.
    27. Frondel, Manuel & Lohmann, Steffen, 2011. "The European Commission's light bulb decree: Another costly regulation?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(6), pages 3177-3181, June.
    28. Kenneth Gillingham & David Rapson & Gernot Wagner, 2016. "The Rebound Effect and Energy Efficiency Policy," Review of Environmental Economics and Policy, Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 10(1), pages 68-88.
    29. Severin Borenstein, 2012. "The Redistributional Impact of Nonlinear Electricity Pricing," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 4(3), pages 56-90, August.
    30. Manuel Frondel & Jorg Peters & Colin Vance, 2008. "Identifying the Rebound: Evidence from a German Household Panel," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 4), pages 145-164.
    31. Wang, H. & Zhou, P. & Zhou, D.Q., 2012. "An empirical study of direct rebound effect for passenger transport in urban China," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 452-460.
    32. Meredith Fowlie & Michael Greenstone & Catherine Wolfram, 2018. "Do Energy Efficiency Investments Deliver? Evidence from the Weatherization Assistance Program," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(3), pages 1597-1644.
    33. Su, Yu-Wen, 2019. "Residential electricity demand in Taiwan: Consumption behavior and rebound effect," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 36-45.
    34. Meyer, Bruce D, 1995. "Natural and Quasi-experiments in Economics," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 13(2), pages 151-161, April.
    35. De Borger, Bruno & Mulalic, Ismir & Rouwendal, Jan, 2016. "Measuring the rebound effect with micro data: A first difference approach," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 1-17.
    36. Hunt Allcott & Nathan Wozny, 2014. "Gasoline Prices, Fuel Economy, and the Energy Paradox," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 96(5), pages 779-795, December.
    37. Ramos, A. & Gago, A. & Labandeira, X. & Linares, P., 2015. "The role of information for energy efficiency in the residential sector," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(S1), pages 17-29.
    38. Boomhower, Judson & Davis, Lucas W., 2014. "A credible approach for measuring inframarginal participation in energy efficiency programs," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 67-79.
    39. Thomas, Brinda A. & Azevedo, Inês L., 2013. "Estimating direct and indirect rebound effects for U.S. households with input–output analysis Part 1: Theoretical framework," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 199-210.
    40. David L. Greene & James R. Kahn & Robert C. Gibson, 1999. "Fuel Economy Rebound Effect for U.S. Household Vehicles," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 3), pages 1-31.
    41. Freire González, Jaume, 2010. "Empirical evidence of direct rebound effect in Catalonia," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(5), pages 2309-2314, May.
    42. Brannlund, Runar & Ghalwash, Tarek & Nordstrom, Jonas, 2007. "Increased energy efficiency and the rebound effect: Effects on consumption and emissions," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 1-17, January.
    43. Winebrake, James J. & Green, Erin H. & Comer, Bryan & Corbett, James J. & Froman, Sarah, 2012. "Estimating the direct rebound effect for on-road freight transportation," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 252-259.
    44. Jin, Sang-Hyeon, 2007. "The effectiveness of energy efficiency improvement in a developing country: Rebound effect of residential electricity use in South Korea," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(11), pages 5622-5629, November.
    45. Bladh, Mats & Krantz, Helena, 2008. "Towards a bright future? Household use of electric light: A microlevel study," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(9), pages 3521-3530, September.
    46. Gillingham, Kenneth & Jenn, Alan & Azevedo, Inês M.L., 2015. "Heterogeneity in the response to gasoline prices: Evidence from Pennsylvania and implications for the rebound effect," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(S1), pages 41-52.
    47. Haas, Reinhard & Biermayr, Peter, 2000. "The rebound effect for space heating Empirical evidence from Austria," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 28(6-7), pages 403-410, June.
    48. Lucas W. Davis & Alan Fuchs & Paul Gertler, 2014. "Cash for Coolers: Evaluating a Large-Scale Appliance Replacement Program in Mexico," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 6(4), pages 207-238, November.
    49. Chun, Natalie & Jiang, Yi, 2013. "How households in Pakistan take on energy efficient lighting technology," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 277-284.
    50. Yu, Xuewei & Moreno-Cruz, Juan & Crittenden, John C., 2015. "Regional energy rebound effect: The impact of economy-wide and sector level energy efficiency improvement in Georgia, USA," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 250-259.
    51. Hunt Allcott & Christopher Knittel & Dmitry Taubinsky, 2015. "Tagging and Targeting of Energy Efficiency Subsidies," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(5), pages 187-191, May.
    52. Hartman, Raymond S, 1988. "Self-Selection Bias in the Evaluation of Voluntary Energy Conservation Programs," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 70(3), pages 448-458, August.
    53. Chitnis, Mona & Sorrell, Steve & Druckman, Angela & Firth, Steven K. & Jackson, Tim, 2013. "Turning lights into flights: Estimating direct and indirect rebound effects for UK households," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 234-250.
    54. Murray, Anthony G. & Mills, Bradford F., 2011. "Read the Label! Energy Star Appliance Awareness and Uptake Among U.S. Consumers," 2011 Annual Meeting, July 24-26, 2011, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 103328, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    55. Chitnis, Mona & Sorrell, Steve & Druckman, Angela & Firth, Steven K. & Jackson, Tim, 2014. "Who rebounds most? Estimating direct and indirect rebound effects for different UK socioeconomic groups," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 12-32.
    56. Iacus, Stefano M. & King, Gary & Porro, Giuseppe, 2012. "Causal Inference without Balance Checking: Coarsened Exact Matching," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 20(1), pages 1-24, January.
    57. Deaton, Angus S & Muellbauer, John, 1980. "An Almost Ideal Demand System," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 70(3), pages 312-326, June.
    58. Lucas W. Davis, 2008. "Durable goods and residential demand for energy and water: evidence from a field trial," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 39(2), pages 530-546, June.
    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. Matthew E. Oliver & Juan Moreno-Cruz & Ross C. Beppler, 2019. "Microeconomics of the rebound effect for residential solar photovoltaic systems," CESifo Working Paper Series 7635, CESifo.
    2. Toroghi, Shahaboddin H. & Oliver, Matthew E., 2019. "Framework for estimation of the direct rebound effect for residential photovoltaic systems," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 251(C), pages 1-1.
    3. Aydin, Erdal, 2016. "Energy conservation in the residential sector : The role of policy and market forces," Other publications TiSEM b9cedba8-1310-4097-90fb-b, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    4. Wang, Zhaohua & Han, Bai & Lu, Milin, 2016. "Measurement of energy rebound effect in households: Evidence from residential electricity consumption in Beijing, China," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 852-861.
    5. repec:hal:gemwpa:hal-00991732 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Dimitropoulos, Alexandros & Oueslati, Walid & Sintek, Christina, 2018. "The rebound effect in road transport: A meta-analysis of empirical studies," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 163-179.
    7. Saunders, Harry D. & Roy, Joyashree & Azevedo, Inês M.L. & Chakravarty, Debalina & Dasgupta, Shyamasree & De La Rue Du Can, Stephane & Druckman, Angela & Fouquet, Roger & Grubb, Michael & Lin, Boqiang, 2021. "Energy efficiency: what has research delivered in the last 40 years?," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 114344, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    8. Dong, Xiao & Klaiber, H. Allen, 2019. "Consumer stockpiling in response to the U.S. EISA “light bulb ban”," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 566-576.
    9. Schleich, Joachim & Mills, Bradford & Dütschke, Elisabeth, 2014. "A brighter future? Quantifying the rebound effect in energy efficient lighting," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 35-42.
    10. Ouyang, Xiaoling & Gao, Beiying & Du, Kerui & Du, Gang, 2018. "Industrial sectors' energy rebound effect: An empirical study of Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 145(C), pages 408-416.
    11. Singhal, Puja & Pahle, Michael & Kalkuhl, Matthias & Levesque, Antoine & Sommer, Stephan & Berneiser, Jessica, 2022. "Beyond good faith: Why evidence-based policy is necessary to decarbonize buildings cost-effectively in Germany," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    12. Moshiri, Saeed & Aliyev, Kamil, 2017. "Rebound effect of efficiency improvement in passenger cars on gasoline consumption in Canada," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 330-341.
    13. Mills, Bradford & Schleich, Joachim, 2014. "Household transitions to energy efficient lighting," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 151-160.
    14. Miriam Berretta & Joshua Furgeson & Yue (Nicole) Wu & Collins Zamawe & Ian Hamilton & John Eyers, 2021. "Residential energy efficiency interventions: A meta‐analysis of effectiveness studies," Campbell Systematic Reviews, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 17(4), December.
    15. Belaïd, Fateh & Youssef, Adel Ben & Lazaric, Nathalie, 2020. "Scrutinizing the direct rebound effect for French households using quantile regression and data from an original survey," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 176(C).
    16. Lang, Ghislaine & Lanz, Bruno, 2022. "Climate policy without a price signal: Evidence on the implicit carbon price of energy efficiency in buildings," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    17. Li, Jianglong & Li, Aijun & Xie, Xuan, 2018. "Rebound effect of transportation considering additional capital costs and input-output relationships: The role of subsistence consumption and unmet demand," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 441-455.
    18. Buettner, Thiess & Madzharova, Boryana, 2019. "Subsidies for Energy Efficient Appliances: Program Design and Consumer Response," VfS Annual Conference 2019 (Leipzig): 30 Years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall - Democracy and Market Economy 203646, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    19. Giraudet, Louis-Gaëtan, 2020. "Energy efficiency as a credence good: A review of informational barriers to energy savings in the building sector," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    20. Chen, Zhenni & Du, Huibin & Li, Jianglong & Southworth, Frank & Ma, Shoufeng, 2019. "Achieving low-carbon urban passenger transport in China: Insights from the heterogeneous rebound effect," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 1029-1041.
    21. Davis, Lucas W. & Martinez, Sebastian & Taboada, Bibiana, 2020. "How effective is energy-efficient housing? Evidence from a field trial in Mexico," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Rebound effect; Heterogeneity; Energy efficiency policy;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • H31 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents - - - Household
    • L68 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Manufacturing - - - Appliances; Furniture; Other Consumer Durables
    • Q14 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - Agricultural Finance

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:kap:enreec:v:84:y:2023:i:1:d:10.1007_s10640-022-00721-x. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.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.