Energy, the Environment and Behaviour Change: A survey of insights from behavioural economics

Abstract

Evidence of climate change is largely undisputed but moderating the impacts not only of climate change but also of resource depletion is a complex, multi-faceted problem. Technical solutions will have a large role to play but engineering behaviour change within households and firms is essential to harnessing the potential for energy efficient consumption, production and investment. To inform debates about behavior change, this paper explores some insights from behavioural economics including analyses of bounded rationality, cognitive bias / heuristics, temporal discounting, social influences, well-being and emotions.