GreenerWeb Challenge

Last registered on July 23, 2024
View Trial History

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
GreenerWeb Challenge
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0014048
Initial registration date
July 18, 2024

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
July 23, 2024, 12:33 PM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Country
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
Region
all

Primary Investigator

Name
Richard Kneller
Affiliation
University of Nottingham
Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Cher Li
PI Affiliation
Aston University
Contact Investigator

Additional Trial Information

Status
In development
Start date
2024-05-01
End date
2025-07-31
Keywords
Behavior, Environment & Energy, Firms & Productivity
Additional Keywords
Web Performance, Digital Technology, Information Provision, Environmental Impact, Digital Sustainability, UK
JEL code(s)
D22, D24, D83, L25, L66
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
Digital technologies enhance business practices in many ways, including allowing connections and therefore sales to be made with customers through their websites. However, they also incur an environmental cost through significant energy consumption. Promoting efficient use of technologies and design practices in website creation can mitigate these impacts. Additionally, signalling of sustainable practices might also be used to attract and retain customers concerned about the environmental implications of digital technologies. This field experiment will contain two parts. In the first RCT, we will seek to understand how different messages motivate firms to take actions that reduce the environmental impact of their websites and to engage with resources/training detailing these actions. The second trial will seek to understand whether the opportunity to signal participation publicly in a challenge to reduce website environmental effects impacts firms’ improvement efforts, in addition to an evaluation of the overall efficacy of the online toolkit intervention.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Kneller, Richard and Cher Li. 2024. "GreenerWeb Challenge." AEA RCT Registry. July 23. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.14048-1.0
Sponsors & Partners
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
The fist intervention is a messaging trial to study whether different environmental messages encourage different responses by firms. Data on a standard set of website performance metrics have been collected and converted into an estimate of the amount of CO2 generated (using a formula from an academic paper on the topic, see below). Benchmarks of the average and best performing websites will then be calculated and included alongside their own performance within individually tailored letters sent to treated firms. The letters are of one of four types, differing in their environmental messaging. Also included within the letter is information about a website with advice on how to reduce the carbon website of the business. Where email addresses are available (2,8000 firms) firms will be sent a pre-message detailing that a letter will soon be arriving and a post-message reminder of the email.

The website will contain an introduction to reducing the carbon footprint of a website in general, some step-by-step guides on reducing image sizes for different editing software and a history of current and past website performance. The latter will be updated over the period of the trial. Where email addresses are available or are provided by the business at log-in, they will be sent emails telling them of an update to the data on the website allowing them to track their performance.

The second trial is an encouragement design among those firms that visit the website. Firms will be randomly assigned to a treatment arm that allows them to publicly signal their participation in the GreenerWeb challenge. The information is provided using mail and/or for those with email addresses, by email, and then via a dedicated website. All firms will have access to the same resources other than the green-badge.
Intervention Start Date
2024-07-29
Intervention End Date
2025-02-28

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Our primary outcomes across the four treatment arms in the first trial will be the number of visits to the GreenerWeb website (measured using the login details sent to them in the initial letter). We will use analytics captured by the website (Page visits, time spent on a page) to study whether/how a firm engages with the online resources. We will also measure whether a firm’s website environmental performance one, two, three, four, five and six months after treatment. Pooling across the four treatment arms, a comparison will be made against the website environmental performance of counterfactual firms.

In the second trial the primary outcomes will be will use analytics captured by the website (Page visits, time spent on a page) to study whether/how a firm engages with online based training resources. We will also measure whether a firm’s website environmental performance one, two, three, four, five and six months after treatment.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Cookies within the greener web challenge badge allow us to track if has been downloaded. A ‘badge installed’ detector will track external URLs have an installed badge on their website.
We will explore heterogeneity in the response according to whether businesses are above or below average in the carbon emissions data at baseline.
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
Participants in the trial are from a single 4-digit SIC industry in the UK that listed a website address. The companies in this sector were identified using registrations at Companies House UK made available through FAME (Bureau Van Dijk). Firms with common owners are excluded from the project.

Experimental Design (Trial 1)
This is a five-arm randomized design:
1. Environmental focused message
2. Customer focused message.
3. Combined message
4. Neutral message
5. Untreated

Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method: We used Stata to carry out the randomization.
Randomization Unit: Random assignment occurs at the firm-level.
Was the treatment clustered? No

Experimental Design (Trial 2) - Pilot trial
This is a two-arm randomized design. Visitors to the GreenerWeb challenge website will be randomly assigned to either one of two groups:
1. Opportunity to download the GreenerWeb challenge badge
2. No opportunity to download the GreenerWeb challenge badge


Experimental Design Details
Not available
Randomization Method
computer: using stata
Randomization Unit
Firms
Was the treatment clustered?
Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
2000 firms
Sample size: planned number of observations
2000 firms
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
17,000
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
It is estimated that a difference in response to the initial offer of between 0.4 and 0.8 percentage points (depending on the overall response rate) will be detectable with 80% power. For the outcomes such as the environmental performance of the website it is estimated that a difference of 0.05 standard deviations between the combined treatment arms and the control group can be detected with 80% power, and about 0.09 standard deviations between each of the treatment groups. Sample size Trial 2: Planned number of observations: Unknown. An estimate approximately 200-400 firms Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms: Approximately 100-200 firms in each arm . With a sample size of 200 there will be 80% power to detect a difference in outcomes between the treatment and control group of 0.4 standard deviations, or 0.3 standard deviations with a sample size of 400.
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
IRB Approval Date
IRB Approval Number
Analysis Plan