Modeling the economic viability and performance of solar home systems: a roadmap towards clean energy for environmental sustainability

Energy is a necessary source of economic development and social prosperity, linked with primary production and consumption activities worldwide. In this regard, solar home systems (SHSs) are beneficial in two ways, i.e., saving vitality overheads and meeting the energy demand of small enterprises. The current study aims to evaluate the performance of adopting SHS to develop the small-scale industry in Pakistan. An inclusive questionnaire survey was conducted, and respondents were selected using the purposive sampling method. As a step further, we scrutinize the moderating role of awareness and understanding of technology between the node of adopting SHS and the monetary enactment of small-scale industry. We authenticate the model using a sample of 357 respondents by applying the partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) technique. The results indicate that low-cost energy through SHSs has a progressive and substantial linkage with the demonstration of small-scale industry and enhances the quality of energy supply in Pakistan. Similarly, awareness and understanding of SHS significantly moderate the relationships between enhanced energy supply through SHS, the quality of SHS, and the performance of the small-scale industry. These findings provide a valuable guideline to the regulation developing authorities that more attention is needed to focus on SHS to further improve the performance of small-scale industry.