Journal
ENERGY ECONOMICS
Volume 45, Issue -, Pages 234-243Publisher
ELSEVIER
DOI: 10.1016/j.eneco.2014.07.007
Keywords
Residential electricity demand; Smart meters; Consumption feedback; Household knowledge; Conservation motivations
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The international roll out of residential smart meters has increased considerably in recent years. The improved consumption feedback provided, and in particular, the installation of in-house displays, has been shown to significantly reduce residential electricity demand in some international trials. This paper attempts to uncover the underlying drivers of such information-led reductions by exploring two research questions. First, does feedback improve a household's stock of information about potential energy reducing behaviours? And second, do improvements in such information help explain the demand reductions associated with the introduction of smart metering and time-of-use tariffs? Data is from a randomised controlled smart metering trial (Ireland) which also collected extensive information on household attitudes towards energy conservation and self-reported stocks of information related to energy saving. As with previous results in Ireland, we find that participation in a smart metering programme with time-of-use tariffs significantly reduces demand. Although treated households also increased their selfreported energy-reducing information, such improvements are not correlated with demand reductions in the short-run. Given this result, it is possible that feedback and other information provided in the context of smart metering are mainly effective in reducing and shifting demand because they act as a reminder and motivator. (C)2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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