Does climate influence households' thermal comfort decisions? Evidence from the 2011 OECD EPIC survey

Abstract

This dissertation investigates how households have been adapting to climate change through the use of two technologies important for thermal comfort, air conditioning and thermal insulation. Merging the 2011 OECD EPIC survey and a global gridded dataset of historical temperatures in a final cross-sectional dataset, I study the determinants of installing air conditioning or of adopting thermal insulation in response to a warmer climate in eight countries, exploting cross-sectional variation. The study also controls for a set of demographic, socio-economic and attitudinal variables that may affect adoption decisions as well. The econometric analysis is based on a binary probit model. The empirical results suggest that exposure to a warmer climate influences only air conditioning adoption, whereas climatic conditions seem not to affect thermal insulation decisions. In addition, wealth, housing characteristics, environmental and energy-saving attitude and presence of minors in the household drive the cooling technology diffusion. Thermal insulation installation mainly depends on wealth, dwelling characteristics, age, household size and propensity to energy-saving behaviours. There is instead no evidence of a possible joint decision for the two technologies.