Volume 2: Innovative Solutions for Energy Transitions: Part I

Estimating the Attractiveness of German Counties for Energetic Retrofitting: A Conjoint-Analysis Approach Johannes Huhn, Philipp Knöpfle, Johannes Knörr, Helge Prüssmann*, Timm Tränkler

Abstract

With climate change threatening the status of affairs, governments have initiated counter-measures aimed at severely reducing energy consumption. This necessitates increasing the energy efficiency in the real estate sector. However, real estate owners often refuse to carry out profitable energetic retrofitting investments, a phenomenon referred to as the energy efficiency gap. To better understand which regional factors may influence individual investment decisions, a conjoint analysis comprising 104 policy makers, commercial property owners and private home owners was conducted, allowing to infer implicit preferences for four countybased attributes with respect to energetic retrofitting. Based on these results, an indicative energetic retrofitting attractiveness score is estimated for all 401 German counties. Furthermore, a comparison of the responses of the different stakeholder groups reveals that policy makers, commercial property owners and private home owners differ in their decision-making regarding energetic retrofitting.

Keywords energy efficiency, energy efficiency gap, energetic retrofitting, conjoint analysis, decision support