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Harnessing Behaviour Change for Promoting Energy Efficiency

  • Published on January 14, 2022

The report ‘harnessing behaviour change for promoting energy efficiency’ provides a foundational understanding of how behavioural science can be leveraged for optimizing space cooling demand in the Indian residential sector. It provides the readers an overview of the cognitive biases that come into play with respect to consumer energy behaviour. It also gives an overview of the behavioural interventions that have been successfully deployed in the energy efficiency space to steer consumer behaviour. These include home energy reports (HERs), smart meters with real-time display, and social interaction programs.

https://aeee.in/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/harnessing-behaviour-change-for-promoting-energy-efficiency.pdf 

The report ‘harnessing behaviour change for promoting energy efficiency’ provides a foundational understanding of how behavioural science can be leveraged for optimizing space cooling demand in the Indian residential sector. It provides the readers an overview of the cognitive biases that come into play with respect to consumer energy behaviour. It also gives an overview of the behavioural interventions that have been successfully deployed in the energy efficiency space to steer consumer behaviour. These include home energy reports (HERs), smart meters with real-time display, and social interaction programs.

Consumer behaviour has a critical role to play in fostering deeper energy savings. Decisions relating to energy use, including indoor temperature settings, adoption of star-labelled appliances, or participation in demand-response programs, are all intricately linked with human behaviour. The actions and attitudes of individuals play a key role in cumulative energy consumption. The rationale for leveraging behavioral tools for the promotion of energy efficiency comes from the realization that humans are the center of energy efficiency action and that barriers preventing the adoption of energy-efficient practices are not entirely technical in nature. Rather such barriers also tend to have a strong sociological and behavioral underpinning. Behaviour change can be a vital force to generate and sustain energy efficient action.

 

The report has important learnings for enhancing communication to improve consumer engagement with sustainable energy consumption and drive behavioural change in consumers. The central purpose of this report is to provide an overview of the ecosystem of behaviour change by outlining the relevant behaviour theories. In tandem, it also outlines common behavioural initiatives deployed in energy efficiency and extracts key learnings from these initiatives which can in turn inform the future design of behavioural interventions. It highlights how the effectiveness of feedback mechanisms for consumers can be pushed by ensuring that the information being communicated to users is clear, simple, and meaningful.

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