Despite its heavy dependency on conventional fuels, Iran is imposed to move towards renewable energyre sources due to a variety of reasons including energy conservation and environmental challenges. Although the residential sector has been in the foci, research indicates that Iranian households are not welcoming this change, therefore this study examines the acceptance intention among householders. In doing so, the study addresses the following questions: first, to what extent householders are ready to shift from conventional energy to renewables? and second, what can be the underpinning factors of such a transition? To follow these questions a theoretical model inspired by the modified framework of the Technology Acceptance Model, Social Acceptance Theory, and Diffusion of Innovation Theory has been developed. Data was collected from 462 rural inhabitants of Mazandaran province in 2019, who had not installed solar panels at the research time. Results show that only 19 percent of households intend to instal solar panels in the near future while 36 percent indicate no intention. Standardized regression weights demonstrate that the strongest total effect on the main dependent variable relates to the perceived ease of use. Overall, the model explains 19% of the variances of the dependent variable.