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Field Before After
Abstract While increasing attention has focused on behavioral biases as barriers to energy efficiency in developed contexts, little work exists in developing settings. We partner with a major producer of energy efficient, charcoal stoves in Kenya to study how limited attention, product uncertainty, and mental accounting affect the perceptions of energy savings and subsequent technology adoption and usage. We first prompt potential purchasers to exercise greater attention by calculating expected savings from the stove. We then study the relationship between this inattention problem and traditional uncertainty by cross-randomizing whether participants have access to a trial stove for a week before making their purchasing decision. Then, to understand whether households view energy savings through the lens of mental accounting we randomly allocate cash transfers equivalent to the expected savings and test for differences in consumption responses. Finally, we use high-frequency monitors to estimate how cash transfers induce consumption changes in order to benchmark the household’s welfare gains derived from improved energy efficiency. Pilot work is ongoing, and we expect to launch the baseline in Spring 2018. See http://www.susannaberkouwer.com/files/theme/BerkouwerJMP.pdf for abstract of Berkouwer & Dean (2022), which presents finding from the 2019 RCT. See the 2022 Pre-Analysis Plan for detail on the 3-year follow up in 2022, focused on health impacts.
Trial End Date December 31, 2019 December 31, 2022
Last Published July 17, 2019 08:59 PM March 17, 2022 11:50 AM
Intervention (Public) This pilot, running from October 2017 - July 2018, will consist of randomized household subsidies of energy efficient cookstoves for 200 households residing in Kibera. A randomized, continuous range of subsidies will induce two groups: adopters and non-adopters. Compliance with subsidies is not expected to be perfect, hence subsidies will be used as an instrument for cookstove ownership. Follow-up via SMS with all households will measure energy expenditures post-intervention. A more complex experimental treatment design will be used for the full-size study later in 2018. See http://www.susannaberkouwer.com/files/theme/BerkouwerJMP.pdf for details of Berkouwer & Dean (2022), which presents finding from the 2019 RCT. See the 2022 Pre-Analysis Plan for details on the 3-year follow up in 2022, focused on health impacts.
Intervention Start Date October 01, 2017 March 01, 2019
Intervention End Date December 31, 2019 December 31, 2022
Primary Outcomes (End Points) The pilot will primarily focus on the following two outcomes: - WTP for energy efficient cookstoves - Energy expenditures post-intervention The more complex treatment design in 2018 will contain additional outcome variables. See http://www.susannaberkouwer.com/files/theme/BerkouwerJMP.pdf for details of Berkouwer & Dean (2022), which presents finding from the 2019 RCT. See the 2022 Pre-Analysis Plan for details on the 3-year follow up in 2022, focused on health impacts.
Primary Outcomes (Explanation) WTP: elicited through a BDM mechanism. Energy expenditures: total household spending on charcoal elicited through follow-up SMS.
Experimental Design (Public) During the pilot, we employ a BDM mechanism to elicit household willingness-to-pay for an energy efficient cookstove, and conditional on household willingness-to-pay, randomize cookstove ownership. Our goal is to enrol 200 households (from a sample pool of 300 recruited households) consisting of 100 adopters and 100 non-adopters. Through an SMS survey we then measure recurring charcoal expenditures to experimentally test for any reduction in energy spending for households in the treatment group. In addition to qualitative information the pilot design will generate two quantitative outcomes: 1) A precise demand curve of cookstoves across a dense distribution of price points, and 2) The treatment effect of cookstove ownership on energy expenditures. We first prompt potential purchasers to exercise greater attention by calculating expected savings from the stove. We then study the relationship between this inattention problem and traditional uncertainty by cross-randomizing whether participants have access to a trial stove for a week before making their purchasing decision. Then, to understand whether households view energy savings through the lens of mental accounting we randomly allocate cash transfers equivalent to the expected savings and test for differences in consumption responses. Finally, we use high-frequency monitors to estimate how cash transfers induce consumption changes in order to benchmark the household’s welfare gains derived from improved energy efficiency. See http://www.susannaberkouwer.com/files/theme/BerkouwerJMP.pdf for details of Berkouwer & Dean (2022), which presents finding from the 2019 RCT. See the 2022 Pre-Analysis Plan for details on the 3-year follow up in 2022, focused on health impacts.
Planned Number of Clusters N/A 1,000
Planned Number of Observations For the pilot: 200 households. A larger sample will be used for the full study. 1,000
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms 100 cookstove adopters and 100 non-adopters. 500 cookstove adopters and 500 non-adopters.
Additional Keyword(s) Behavioral, Development
Keyword(s) Environment And Energy Behavior, Environment And Energy, Health
Building on Existing Work Yes
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Analysis Plans

Field Before After
Document
BerkouwerDean_JDEPAP_StovesHealth.pdf
MD5: 02f425465955a421a06a9090a6c5d5f5
SHA1: f2d6a63c16ea50a3c012b543596264ca93579d7a
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Other Primary Investigators

Field Before After
Affiliation Massachusetts Institute of Technology University of Chicago
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