Neighbourhood Patterns in Home Retrofit Uptake: Evidence of Spatial Clustering in Scotland’s Energy Performance Data

Background and Motivation: Decarbonising the existing housing stock is essential for achieving net-zero targets, particularly in countries with ageing, energy-inefficient homes like the UK. The uptake of retrofit measures remains patchy and socially uneven. Growing evidence points to peer effects, which is the tendency for households to copy nearby adopters, as a powerful but under-used driver of change 1–5. Yet Most peer-effect studies focus on a single, highly visible technology, solar photovoltaics (PV). Little is known about whether peer diffusion also drives “fabric-first” measures that deliver energy sufficiency but are less conspicuous, nor how these dynamics play out across Scotland’s small-area “Data Zones (DZ)” where retrofit meets place-based deprivation and the just-transition duties of local authorities.