Tuesday, October 28th 204,

From the Washington Post:

According to a new study, though, politics and income may not be such important factors after all. Examining the spread of solar photovoltaic residential installations in Connecticut, two researchers at Yale and the University of Connecticut found instead that the single most important factor driving whether a given house installed solar was peer influence — whether other houses nearby had recently done so.

While the author goes on to term this phenomenon “green envy” and ascribe it to one’s desire to show off their environmentalism, we’d point out that, simply by seeing solar in one’s community, people otherwise unaware of the benefits of solar may begin to consider it seriously for the first time. Its not a desire to “show off,” its simply seeing that solar can works for your neighbors, and therefore for you.

Regardless, the research is interesting and worth a read over at WashingtonPost.com.