Volume 13: Low Carbon Cities and Urban Energy Systems: Part II

Rethinking willingness to pay for renewable energy electricity in China Boqiang Lin, Yufang Chen*

Abstract

With the continuous increase in residential electricity consumption, attention should be paid to the issue of renewable energy power consumed by residents. Rethinking residents’ willingness to pay for renewable energy electricity is of great significance to the long-term development goal of renewable energy. This paper finds that residents’ willingness to support the development of renewable energy is growing. Respondents with the more participation in renewable energy planning, and the more satisfaction with the implementation of renewable energy policies, as well as a higher recognition of the high cost of renewable energy, are willing to use renewable energy and are willing to pay more for renewable energy power. Moreover, respondents who are willing to use renewable energy are willing to pay more for renewable energy electricity. Although respondents are more willing to use voluntary payment mechanisms for payment, they are more likely to pay more for renewable energy power under the mandatory payment mechanism. At present, there is a large gap between the actual green power purchase behavior of Chinese residents and the expected WTP, mainly because there are many problems in the voluntary subscription mechanism for green power certificates.

Keywords Willingness to pay; Renewable energy electricity; Willingness to use; Mandatory and voluntary payments; Tradable green power certificate