**1. Introduction**

The sustainable use of energy has been a key challenge amongst many countries. Malaysia's rampant usage of scarce viable energy, such as coal, crude oil, natural gas, and fossil fuel, has led to resource exhaustion, which could lead to further detrimental implications if not addressed immediately. An extensive dependence on fossil fuels has triggered

**Citation:** Aravindan, K.L.;

Thurasamy, R.; Raman, M.; Ilhavenil, N.; Annamalah, S.; Rathidevi, A.S. Modeling Awareness as the Crux in Solar Energy Adoption Intention through Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology. *Mathematics* **2022**, *10*, 2045. https:// doi.org/10.3390/math10122045

Academic Editors: María del Carmen Valls Martínez, José-María Montero and Pedro Antonio Martín Cervantes

Received: 22 March 2022 Accepted: 22 April 2022 Published: 13 June 2022

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**Copyright:** © 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/).

global shifts towards other forms of renewable energy, particularly solar. Each country has different renewable energy sources owing to geographical location. Consequently, many initiatives have been drafted by governments to encourage consumers to adopt renewable energy sources with solar energy adoption positioned as key to sustaining the Earth. These initiatives were also formalised in the year 2015 by 193 member countries, hence the birth of United Nation's 2030 Agenda for Sustainability Development comprising 17 goals, where Goal seven pertains to affordable and clean energy [1–3]. Subsequent initiatives, namely the Green Deal, Horizon Europe, and the European Urban Agenda, have mooted sustainable and livable futures where clean energy transition and sustainable area transition must be fair, inclusive, and abandons nobody [4].

Malaysia, a member of United Nations, is located in Southeast Asia and encompasses Sabah, Sarawak, and Peninsular Malaysia. The country's total area is approximately 330,000 km<sup>2</sup> and blessed with a tropical climate. Particularly, the country enjoys tropical weather throughout the year because of its proximity to the equator. Although Malaysia benefits from sunshine throughout the year, the use of solar energy as an alternative form of energy remains low in the country as compared to European countries who are governed by four seasons, yet able to enhance sustainability efforts through renewable energy [2,3]. In fact, technology advancement, especially the Internet of Things (IOT), which promotes smart cities by connecting various devices such as power plants and residential houses is seen to lay a strong opportunity for solar energy adoption [5] but in Malaysian soil, despite embracing technological advancement and smart cities, solar energy adoption remains inconsequential. Therefore, this calls for further investigations on solar energy adoption intention.

Prior studies that have examined solar energy adoption in Malaysia remain inconclusive. Practitioners have often cited that such issues as minimal government incentives, weak demand, limited public–private partnerships, and poor consumer acceptance prevent the extensive use of solar energy. However, academicians have suggested that solar energy can be a viable substitute, thus performance expectancy (PE), effort expectancy (EE), and awareness could influence its adoption [6,7]. In fact, solar energy adoption would be a precursor to internalizing renewable energy especially in the electric car, a key to curb CO2 emission where charging stations could be powered up with solar energy. To achieve this, the Malaysian society must be aware of solar technology and its benefits. A literature survey on renewable energy (Appendix B) was conducted. It a nutshell, it has revealed the benefits of renewable solar energy, thus awareness programmes are to be the uppermost ingredient to kick start understanding of the benefits of solar energy.

The present study is set on [8], as bases to examine the elements that impact adoption of solar energy amongst consumers in Malaysia. Particularly, elements such as awareness, performance expectancy (PE), effort expectancy (EE), facilitating condition (FC), and social influence (SI) are examined in relation to solar energy adoption intention amongst Malaysians.

#### **2. Materials and Methods**

Solar energy has been recognised as a potential alternative energy source [6,7]. Traditional energy sources are seen as detrimental to environmental sustainability, thereby severely impacting the Earth owing to the expanding energy demand [9–11]. Solar remains as the prime source for unlimited and free energy [12] specifically in Malaysia, which is at a full advantage because of its location near the equator, where sun rays are nearly present throughout the year. Despite the advantages, embracing solar energy is exigent and clouded with high initial challenges coupled with the switching costs from conventional fossil fuel to solar power. Nevertheless, this situation promises various long-term benefits energy [12].

A major factor that prevents solar energy from being used extensively in Malaysia is the awareness that this energy source is a viable substitute for traditional sources; thus, lack of awareness could further hinder behavioural intentions. As such, green awareness

is considered a vital component of successful green initiatives [13,14]. The literature has suggested that the possibilities of green adoption are high when appropriate awareness is administered towards such initiatives [10].

Studies have reiterated that, amongst recent theories acquainted to behavioural intention, UTAUT has the strongest predictive and explanatory power that is applaudable for its resiliency being operationalised across multifold fields. Ref. [15] developed the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UATUT) by condensing and merging eight technology acceptance and use models [8,16], that conceived four core factors, namely, PE, EE, SI, and FC, in predicting intention.

Intention to adopt refers to people's subjective probability that they will perform a behaviour [17]. Thus, UTAUT has been accepted irrefutably for its abundance of merits amongst behavioural intention studies. Although the first decade of UTAUT's inception attracted related studies on information technology and systems [13,18] other disciplines subsequently gained traction [8,19,20].

UTAUT has also been used in the context of examining the adoption of green initiatives [21–23]. Studies have likewise used UTAUT in examining solar energy adoption [10,24]. Ref. [25] conveyed three broad types of integration/extension in fortifying UTAUT's generalisability, among which is the inclusion of exogenous predictors to UTAUT predictors.

The present study takes a cue from the preceding and subsequent propositions of [8], in which various exogenous, endogenous, and intervening variables are to be incorporated to add to UTAUT's radius, and examines the significance of awareness towards PE, EE, and FC in the context of solar power adoption. Consequently, these variables, in addition to SI, are tested towards rendering impact on the intention to adopt solar energy. Four items were operationalised to measure the intention to adopt, of which, three were adapted from [10] and one from [17]. The overall research framework is depicted in Figure 1.

**Figure 1.** Schematic diagram of research model and its exogenous and endogenous variables.

#### *2.1. Awareness*

Generally, awareness relates to the state of being informed and alert [26]. In this context, green awareness is defined as a concern for environmental issues that influences people's decision-making and behavioural intentions [27]. Similarly, ref. [10] defined awareness in relation to technology adoption as the users' magnitude of consciousness towards new technology, its benefits, drawbacks, and use.

Awareness can also be termed as a personal ability to recognise and focus on the existence of certain phenomenon, objects, products, or services in addition to being the omnipresent knowledge from continuous contact [9,11]. Ref. [7] conducted research involving undergraduate university students in Pakistan and reported awareness as an important element in green behaviour [10]. Ref. [28] study did obtain similar findings whereas [29] used UTAUT in the mobile banking environment of Saudi Arabia to investigate the role of awareness as antecedent to PE and EE. Their findings suggested its significance towards PE and EE. In the case of Malaysia, ref. [30] Ramayah et al. (2012) used the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) and found that awareness plays a vital role in adopting recycling behaviour amongst university students.

Ref. [31] revealed the scarcity of research on solar energy adoption amongst developing countries. In Malaysia's context, the low acquisition of solar energy, despite various initiatives by the government calls for investigations on green awareness towards building expectations, invokes intentions to adopt solar energy, which is the best predictor of actual behaviour [11]. Therefore, the present study adopts green awareness from [10], of which four items are operationalised to measure green awareness towards rendering its impact on three variables of UTAUT in the context of solar energy adoption.

**H1.** *Awareness has a positive effect on PE.*

**H2.** *Awareness has a positive effect on EE.*

**H3.** *Awareness has a positive effect on FC.*
