摘要：While it is increasingly popular to broadcast information regarding environmental impact,
little is known regarding the effects that this information has on human behavior. This
research aims to provide insight into whether, and to what extent, presenting
environmental attributes of transport alternatives influences individual transport
decisions. We designed and conducted three experiments in which subjects (UC
Berkeley undergraduates) were presented with hypothetical scenarios of transport
decisions, including auto purchase choice, mode choice, and route choice. We analyzed
their decisions via a choice model to determine how they value reducing their
emissions relative to other attributes. We found that our subjects are willing to
adjust their behavior to reduce emissions, exhibiting an average willingness to
pay for emissions reduction, or value of green (VoG), of 15 cents per pound of
CO2 saved. Despite concern that people cannot meaningfully process quantities of
CO2, we found evidence to the contrary in our subject pool in that the estimated VoG was
consistent across context (the wide range of transport decisions that we presented) and
presentation (e.g., whether the information was presented in tons or pounds, or
whether a social reference point of the emissions of an average person was provided).
We also found significant heterogeneity in VoG, with most of the respondents
valuing green somewhere between 0 and 70 cents per pound and with women,
on average, willing to pay 7 cents more per saved pound than men. While the
findings are encouraging, further work is required to determine whether they hold
outside of a lab environment and with a more representative pool of subjects.
