Energy saving behaviours of middle class households in Ghana, Peru and the Philippines

Never, Babette / Sascha Kuhn / Hanna Fuhrmann-Riebel / Jose Ramon Albert / Sebastian Gsell / Miguel Jaramillo / Bernardin Senadza
External Publications (2022)

in: Energy for Sustainable Development (68), 170-181

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.esd.2022.03.003
Open access

Demand-side management of energy seeks to foster energy efficiency investments and curtailment behaviour in households. The role of environmental concern and knowledge for both types of energy saving behaviour has hardly been investigated in middle income countries with growing middle classes and rising electricity demand. Drawing on unique household survey data from Ghana, Peru and the Philippines, this paper analyses the links from individual motivation to behaviour, and from behaviour to the impact on households' total electricity expenditures. We find that consumers with more environmental concern are more likely to adopt curtailment behaviours, but that concern does not influence energy efficiency investments. In turn, higher levels of environmental knowledge make households' energy efficiency investments more likely, but do not influence curtailment. Neither energy efficiency investments nor curtailment behaviours significantly impact households' electricity expenditures. Small differences between Ghana, Peru and the Philippines exist.

About the authors

Never, Babette

Political Scientist

Never
Fuhrmann-Riebel

Kuhn, Sascha

Social Psychology

Kuhn

Further experts

Altenburg, Tilman

Economic Geography 

Banerjee, Aparajita

Environmental and Resource Sociology, Public Policy 

Inacio da Cunha, Marcelo

Economics, Geography 

Pegels, Anna

Economist 

Tamasiga, Phemelo

Economics