Quantifying energy demand reduction considering householder willingness to apply measures

ABSTRACT

Reducing energy demand in the domestic sector will be an important feature of future energy systems but is challenging to achieve in practice. Solutions lie in a range of building fabric and system improvements as well as adopting more sustainable routines and conceptions of normality in the home. The impact of such measures has so far been quantified without considering the willingness of the householder to adopt them. This paper uses a modelling approach to evaluate the effectiveness of technical and lifestyle measures to reduce energy demand in six households based on monitoring data and insights from interviews. The results are benchmarked against estimated tailored 2050 reduction targets and demonstrate that although these targets are achievable in the studied homes, householders might not always be willing to apply them. The resultant reduction pathways are shown to vary significantly between households, suggesting that bespoke strategies are needed to allow households to identify and select the most appropriate methods that allow them to maximize demand reduction.

KEYWORDS:

• Domestic energy demand reduction
• retrofit
• technology
• lifestyle
• user centred design
• family homes

Acknowledgements

This paper forms part of the work produced under the LEEDR: Low Effort Energy Demand Reduction Project based at Loughborough University, UK. The work was funded through the TEDDI call managed by the RCUK Digital Economy and Energy programmes (EPSRC Grant Number EP/I000267/1). The LEEDR project gratefully acknowledges the participation of the families in the study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

R. A. Buswell http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0613-9516

Additional information

Funding

The work was funded through the TEDDI call managed by the RCUK Digital Economy and Energy programmes (EPSRC Grant Number EP/I000267/1).