Promoting the energy transition: The role of decision context and climate risk in the investment in solar versus nuclear energy

The energy transition requires modernizing the energy sector and investing in alterna-tives to fossil fuels. Both nuclear and renewable energies are potential solutions to lowercarbon emissions, although nuclear power is generally less favored by public opinion.We investigated whether support and feelings for solar farms and nuclear power plantsconstruction vary depending on whether these energy sources are evaluated separately(SE) or jointly (JE). We also examined how climate change risk perception influenceswillingness to invest (WTI) in these power plants and their perceived risks. Results con-firmed that solar farms elicited more positive attitudes and feelings than nuclear powerplants. Crucially, when evaluated in JE (vs. SE), solar farms were viewed even morepositively and received greater support, whereas nuclear plants were perceived morenegatively. Climate change risk perception correlated with the perception of nuclearplants as riskier and solar farms as less risky. There was marginally significant evi-dence that the former relationship emerged only in SE, whereas the latter was morepronounced in SE (vs. JE). Furthermore, climate change risk perception positively pre-dicted the WTI in solar farms, but only in JE. In contrast, the WTI in nuclear powerremained unaffected in both contexts. Finally, the perceived risk of each energy sourcewas negatively associated with the WTI in them. These results offer insights into thepsychological factors influencing people’s perception and support for alternative energyinfrastructures and can help develop effective communication strategies to facilitate asmooth and successful energy transition