The continuous growth of global human population has seen a rise of ongoing concerns about climate change and rising greenhouse gas emissions and how our planet will cope with this in the future. It is believed to tackle these challenges we need to be consuming more ‘Green Technology’. Green technology has been recognised by organisations such as the UN and European Commission as a central component to meet carbon free goals with emphasis on reducing the level of carbon being emitted from transport use. Simply stated, the more green technology being consumed across society the more likely we as a global society become carbon free. Subsequently the introduction of Battery Electric Vehicles (BEV) i.e cars powered entirely by electric battery power, not only coincides with the goal of green technology but directly addresses the carbon emission concerns and wider environment impacts.

In spite of the support expressed by governments and stakeholders to increase the consumption of green technology primarily by targeting wide spread BEV adoption, the act of adopting and consuming one or in some cases acceptance of them among consumers are not in resemblance with targeted levels of adoption (Biresselioglu et al. 2018; Singh et al. 2020; Higueras-Castillo et al. 2020). To address this matter, academic scholars and wider industry researchers have investigated to understand the possible causes for this. In other words, try to understand the how’s and why’s that drive consumers’ intention to adopt a BEV. Hence this study positions its research to examine consumers’ behaviour towards BEV adoption in Wales from a consumer behaviour perspective.

My research investigates why there is a lack of BEV adoption by seeking to understand how ‘the self’ may shape BEV adoption. The theoretical lens of Belk (1988) Extended Self (where this denotes that we deem our possession can be a physical or symbolic extension and representation of our identity) and consideration of human emotion such as pride is used to understand how this may shape BEV adoption. This study uses mixed methods approach where qualitative data in the form of interviews with current BEV consumers and quantitative data in the form of a questionnaire with non-BEV consumers are used.

This project intends to develop knowledge that will aid in increasing BEV adoption among welsh consumers and provide key information and recommendations to the Welsh Government and stakeholders concerning BEV adoption and other forms of green technology consumption.