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Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine how national institutional structures affect farmers’ intentions to invest in renewable energy enterprises in the UK agricultural sector. Design/methodology/approach – The authors draw on the construct of national institutional profile to identify the regulatory, cognitive and normative institutions affecting entrepreneurial intentions. A postal questionnaire survey of 2,000 farmers was carried out in the West Midlands Region of the UK and 393 usable responses were obtained. Principal component analysis and multivariate data analysis techniques are employed. Findings – Cognitive institutions were positively related to intentions. Contrary to expectations, the regulatory institutions were not associated with entrepreneurial intentions. Normative institutions were significantly related to intentions and interestingly, moderated the efficacy of regulatory institutions on entrepreneurial intentions. Practical implications – Cognitive and normative institutions may play a far more important role in determining farm entrepreneurship in the renewable energy sector than has been previously considered. Given that much of policy research is often biased towards regulatory institutions, this research shows that the construct of institutional profile offers a useful framework to investigate the effect of national level institutions on entrepreneurship. Originality/value – This study contributes to the literature on entrepreneurship in the UK farm sector. It is the first study that demonstrates the role of the country’s institutional profile on farmers’ intentions to invest in RE. The existence of moderation effects between national institutions suggests that research focusing on single dimensions is likely to provide biased results.