The SILCI team have a new open access paper published in Annual Review of Environment and Resources. Here’s a taster in the form of a mock interview!
What is your article about?
Our article analyses a range of digital innovations available to consumers for providing alternative low-carbon forms of mobility, food buying, and domestic living. We identify why these innovations appeal to consumers, and we quantify their potential impact on carbon emissions. We also consider the broader disruptive effects of digital consumer innovations on mainstream markets and forms of service provision.
Why does it matter?
Digital consumer innovations have an important role to play in efforts to reach net zero emission. They can directly help reduce emissions by displacing higher-carbon forms of mobility, food buying, and domestic living. They can also indirectly help reduce emissions by disrupting mainstream consumer practices which rely on private cars, supermarket food shops, and passive use of energy.
What are the policy implications of this work?
Public policy has a critical role to play in steering digital consumer innovations towards delivering emission-reduction benefits. Policy objectives include managing induced demand or ‘rebound’ effects, enabling market access for disruptive innovators, learning from urban-scale experiments particularly with new forms of mobility. Policymakers also need to strengthen their digital capabilities to anticipate and steer change dynamics toward societal goals.
What is your hope for the future of this field?
Our understanding of the impact of digital consumer innovations on emission-reduction goals should be strengthened through field trials in real-world conditions and natural experiments using market data. We also need to understand the conditions under which adoption and use of digital consumer innovations can substitute for or displace higher-carbon mainstream consumer practices.
What are the policy implications of your work?
Public policy has a critical role to play in steering digital consumer innovations towards delivering emission-reduction benefits. Policy objectives include managing induced demand or ‘rebound’ effects, enabling market access for disruptive innovators, learning from urban-scale experiments particularly with new forms of mobility. Policymakers also need to strengthen their digital capabilities to anticipate and steer change dynamics toward societal goals.