Consumer Acceptance of Renewable Energy in Peninsular Malaysia
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments
Renewable energy (RE) is a research hotspot. This manuscript is highly representative in the study area of Peninsula Malaysia. Malaysia is a new and diversified economic country. It represents the development trend of emerging economies. However, although there are still some problems that need attention.
The main problems are as follows.
1. Are the three keywords of “belief, concern and knowledge” too simple? Does they not reflect the subject attribute or scientificity?
2. It is suggested to add the case keyword of “Malaysia”.
3. Moderate English changes should be required. For example: “between 2015 and 2050” on line 66 and “between 35 and 44 years old” on line 454 are very inappropriate.
4. “people” on line 68 should be “persons”.
5. The structure of the article needs to be adjusted. The introduction is too much. It is suggested to separate the literature review into one chapter from “1. Introduction”.
6. In the last paragraph of “1. Introduction”, a frame introduction of the rest of the manuscript needs to be added.
7. The citation format of references is not standardized. For example: “Lim and Teong [52]” on line 369, 385, “Muhammad-Sukki et al. [16]” on line 398 and “Krejcie and Morgan [55]” on line 434, “Bang et al. [8], Zografakis et al. [56], and Alam et al. [12]” on line 440, etc.
8. Figure 3 is too simplistic. Is it necessary to exist?
9. This paragraph on lines 439-445 should be included in the literature review.
10. The manuscript did not introduce the data source and pretreatment separately, i.e. relevant information of the questionnaire.
11. The statements of hypotheses are inconsistent, for example: “H1: Consumers who are concern for the environment tend positively are willing to pay more for using renewable energy. ” on line 378-379 and “H1: Consumer who is concern for the environment tend to be more willing to pay more for using RE.” on line 528-529.
12. In the discussion part, it should be very clear whether the three hypotheses mentioned above have been verified.
13. Recommendations should be sorted into several items to increase readability.
14. "6" in "6. Copyrights" is unnecessary.
15. At the end of the article, there is a lack of specific research prospects.
16. The format of references is not unified.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
This paper about consumer behavior regarding Renewable Energy is interesting because it addresses a topic that is not so frequently investigated or those investigation is not so often divulgated to a larger readership.
But it suffers some drawbacks.
First, its definition of energy is rather simple. We will recommend to have a deeper view on the issue. See: https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-24021-9_12
& https://doi.org/10.1093/jwelb/jwaa012
Second, its characterization of Renewable Energy seems to be also too simplified and idealized. "RE sources don't run out, and they are spread out over a large area. These resources are quickly replenished by natural processes. There won't be any pollution problems because of it." The problem is that Energy exists as Energy when it's captured & stocked. And to capture and stock wind, solar or hydro energy we need things which in themselves are not renewable and whose extraction is polluting. Many things have written on this topic. To quote a media & NGO source: "Naturally abundant wind, geothermal, solar, tidal and electric energy are being hastened as the future of the planet's energy needs. And rare earth elements are used in a bevy of technolgies to generate this cleaner, renewable energy. ... Extraction and mining of rare earth metals involves similar land-use exploitation, environmental damage and ecological burden as any other mining operation. They are mined using extremely energy-intensive processes, spewing carbon emissions into the atmosphere and toxins into the ground." I think this aspect of the problem SHOULD be included in the paper otherwise its description of ER is far too rosy.
Third, there are no indications about from where the technology and material from ER comes: what about technology dependency in Malaysia? what about ER debt trap in relation to China? what about international aid?
Fourth, there is no questionning about the issue of energy justice: this aspect is totally ignored. It inquires willingness to pay more. But if access to affordable energy is a right how to deal with that?
Fifth, the paper does not question the issue of sobriety. It never addresses the issue of why energy is needed and what for? Is the problem with energy lies only in its price and its consumption? Actually a lot of cheap energy will be even more disastrous for the planet since it will mean more development, growth, cutting trees, building constructions etc. The issue of development is taken for granted.
Sixth, there is a strange contradiction. In the summary it is said: "Nevertheless, consumers are still unaware that renewable energy is much affordable due to their lack of awareness and knowledge on energy use" But the paper aims to demonstrate willingness to pay MORE. So we need to think it's affordable to pay more??
Seventh, the fact that belief in ER is important for willingness to pay more is obvious. The authors did not stress enough what is the specificity of their research (since they say similar findings have been made: Previous research by Bang et al. [8] found that consumers' willingness to pay more 612 for RE was related to their concern, knowledge, and beliefs about the effects of using RE.) : simply the fact that it's demonstrated in the case of Malaysia?
Eight, some English revision will be needed - see for example "Consumer who are beliefs about positive consequences are willing to pay more 554 for renewable energy." who HAVE?
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
1. "person" on line 593, 641, 642 and 659 should be "persons".
2. "SPSS" on line 686 should be specific to SPSS25.0 or SPSS26.0 in “3. Hypothesis and Methods”.
Author Response
Please see the attachment
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors have substantially revised the paper accordingly to commentors' suggestions.
Author Response
Thank you for reviewing this manuscript. No changes on the manuscript.
