WP 1 Description

Framing: Development of the theoretical framework

WP1 establishes the theoretical basis for understanding:

  • The acceptance of new technical and end user interaction schemes (e.g. tackling the concerns about privacy);
  • The behaviour of individual consumers (including the chances of non-monetary incentives by applying psychological, marketing and societal means);
  • The positioning of end users in the new energy/electricity landscape as revealed in possible smart grid business models;
  • The relation between the ‘Smart Grid' and the ‘Smart Home' discussion (concentrating on the improvement of comfort from the end-user point of view by using advanced end user interfaces and in-home displays).

WP1 will draw upon a wide range of relevant information, including the available theoretical literature on sustainable consumption and production from various disciplines (sociology, economics, psychology, engineering, marketing etc.), experiences with related projects and policy programmes (end use efficiency and DSM in particular), and expert knowledge of the project partners. T he literature review will allow us to establish the various conceptions of end user awareness and involvement measures and different technical, socio-economic and social user interaction solutions in a future smart grid market models for different types of end users (e.g. home owners, tenants, SMEs and industry). Such an inventory is needed because consumers' willingness and ability to actively manage their energy demand will also depend on relations with other actors (DSM via direct control, DSM via price signals, contracts with an aggregator offering novel tariff structures, interventions using methods from social or marketing psychology etc.).

The result of both, the theoretical framework and the review of empirical literature, will inform further S3C analyses in terms of:

  • Providing criteria for the selection of cases (from the ‘Family of Projects') to be discussed (cf. WP2):
  • Looking for further validation of active demand responses covered in the literature review, or
  • Looking for data on active demand responses to end-user interfaces not yet discussed;
  • Providing the ‘protocol' for questioning the AD principles and practices employed in the cases under investigation (cf. WP3);
  • Providing a short list of KPIs against which success or failure of active demand programs can be measured.



© THE S3C CONSORTIUM 2013