Referrals are pivotal to solar adoption in underserved California communities

Solar leads and installations successful disadvantaged communities bash not travel from telephone calls oregon emails from star companies but alternatively from referrals by friends nearby, finds caller probe by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) connected California income-qualified star programs.

On the other end, programme disqualification owed to intricate eligibility requirements is the biggest root of mislaid oregon uninterested prospective star adopters successful the California programs.

This probe is portion of the multiyear Solar Energy Evolution and Diffusion Studies funded by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Solar Energy Technologies Office. In this study, NREL utilized California information and predictive models to find the likelihood of star referral and adoption among low- to moderate-income households—generally defined arsenic a household of 4 making little than 80% of the median household income for their area. The findings, published successful Energy Research & Social Science, tin assistance to place palmy star uptake strategies for communities that person been near retired of the manufacture to date.

Why star adoption successful disadvantaged communities matters

Some communities look much barriers to installing rooftop star systems than others, including currency constraints, not owning their homes, and connection barriers. For these reasons and more, star adoption successful the United States is concentrated successful middle- and upper-income households.

As much high-income households follow solar, retail energy prices could summation and marque it harder for households who enactment a larger stock of their income toward their vigor bills, besides known arsenic vigor burden. However, determination is method imaginable for hundreds of gigawatts of star connected U.S. households that look higher vigor burden—equivalent to offsetting 84% of yearly energy consumption.

"It's important for each households to person entree to rooftop solar," said Ben Sigrin, NREL elder vigor modeler and main researcher of the study. "If we tin grow star adoption to low- to moderate-income families, we tin trim vigor burden, make much equitable entree to renewable energy, and summation decarbonization."

In summation to his NREL work, Sigrin is presently a chap with DOE supporting the Justice40 Initiative—a program to present 40% of the wide benefits of clime investments to disadvantaged communities, arsenic good arsenic to pass equitable research, development, and deployment.

Modeling mislaid leads and referrals

In this latest signifier of the Solar Energy Evolution and Diffusion Studies, NREL looked to the California authorities authorities to amended recognize star adoption successful disadvantaged communities. California runs the astir star programs directed to these communities successful the United States, with astir 80,000 leads and 11,000 installations connected income-qualified households.

For this research, NREL partnered with GRID Alternatives, which has administered California's state-wide star programs for implicit a decade, wherever income-qualified families successful California tin get a solar system astatine nary cost. Despite the subsidies, GRID Alternatives spends astir $1,200 per instal connected lawsuit acquisition.

NREL aggregated aggregate information sets to make a new, unprecedented household-level information acceptable for star pb acquisition, referrals, and adoption successful California done 2018—a uniquely broad presumption of these California star programs to date.

NREL past created 2 models that were trained to marque decisions based connected the California data: 1 to foretell if a prospective star adopter becomes "lost" oregon uninterested, and different to foretell whether a star adopter decides to notation star to their network. Important insights emerged.

Referrals are pivotal to participation

As modeled, referrals are the azygous largest root of prospective star adopters successful the California underserved communities and 1 of the astir effectual mechanisms for converting funny adopters into installations. In addition, the person the referrer, the much apt the prospective adopter volition instal and notation star to their ain network.

The biggest root of mislaid oregon uninterested prospective star adopters is programme disqualification owed to stringent income, geographic, and location ownership eligibility requirements.

Based connected the results, those who plan authorities star programs could 1) see referral mechanisms, redeeming unit clip and resources to get and person prospective star adopters, and 2) loosen qualification requirements to widen star to much households.

"Many lessons tin beryllium learned from the California data," Sigrin said. "More flexible eligibility requirements and referral mechanisms wrong programs could assistance summation star adoption successful much communities crossed the state and trim administrative load for star programme staff."

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More information: Ben Sigrin et al, The star influencer adjacent door: Predicting debased income star referrals and leads, Energy Research & Social Science (2021). DOI: 10.1016/j.erss.2021.102417