Investigating Willingness to Invest in Renewable Energy to Achieve Energy Targets and Lower Carbon Emissions

Abstract

There is a keen interest in renewable energy sources (RES) as a key aspect of reducing the emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG). Supporting policies have facilitated citizen investments in renewable energy, as such investments can make a substantial contribution to emissions reduction. The problem, however, is that the factors affecting citizen willingness- to invest in renewable energy are still uncertain and tend to constantly change, highlighting the need to perform studies on the subject more frequently. As citizen investments in RES can contribute to emissions reduction, the aim of this study is to understand the factors that affect the willingness of citizens to invest in renewable energy. Using simple random sampling, a representative sample of 1536 citizens in an EU country was administered structured questionnaires, and the results were analyzed using logistic regression. It was shown that willingness to invest is affected by both financial and non-financial factors, such as citizens’ agreement with the construction of renewable facilities near their residence, information sources for obtaining information about environmental and energy topics, satisfaction with the media’s coverage of renewable investments, and their occupation. Results from this study raise substantial policy implications and may be used to improve the design of strategies for attracting citizen investments.

Empowering Sustainability: Understanding Determinants of Consumer Investment in Microgrid Technology in the UAE

“…Although there is a widespread optimistic outlook on investing in these power grid and REs, obstacles such as financial limitations and inadequate institutional funding impede large-scale investments. Research conducted in Greece [28,29] and the Middle East, namely Qatar [30], showed that the inclination of individuals to financially support local initiatives is notably impacted by socio-demographic characteristics and community attitudes. Notwithstanding these obstacles, implementing strategies such as utilizing insurance schemes to distribute expenses over a period, incentivizing social involvement, and increasing public knowledge have the potential to improve customer participation in sustainable-energy-related expenditures.…”

“…To sum up, several studies discuss the effects of public awareness on the willingness of its members to invest in and pay for microgrid projects [6,[18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29]. For instance, for [19], the marginal significance of profitable returns in influencing the public's willingness to invest contrasts with some studies that emphasize the pivotal role of financial returns in driving technology adoption.…”

Performance Assessment User Interface to Enhance the Utilization of Grid-Connected Residential PV Systems

“…In addition, the renewable energy resources are being integrated into conventional power to increase the production of green energy [2,3]. Consequently, the energy providers and power plants designers have set new standards and requirements to accommodate the continuous increase in power generators deployments as well as to meet the global environmental agreements and green energy future targets [3][4][5]. Emerging the distributed generations (DGs) is one of the significant methodologies to accommodate different energy resources especially in modern and smart grids [6,7].…”