Diffusion of Energy‐Conserving Innovations

Abstract

We suggest that people's decisions to adopt energy‐conserving processes and products is a specific instance of the decision to adopt an innovation. Drawing on previous research, we postulate a set of eight dimensions by means of which energy‐conserving innovations are evaluated. We further argue that people's perceptions of an innovation's characteristics, on these dimensions, determine their decisions to adopt that innovation. Again in keeping with past research, we suggest that information that determines people's perceptions of innovations is more likely to be transmitted via social networks rather than mass media or other channels of communication. Taken together, these propositions form a theory of the adoption and diffusion of energy‐conserving innovations. A research program is sketched that would provide support for the theory.