How to engage households in energy sufficiency? The case of ENERGISE living labs in 8 European countries

The ENERGY Institute invites Marlyne Sahakian, Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Geneva, specialized in consumption studies, on 18 September 2019 at the Smart Living Lab in Fribourg.

In a review of over 1,000 initiatives aimed at reducing or improving energy usage in the home, the ENERGISE project found that a majority of initiatives relied on the idea of changing people’s behavior, or changing technologies towards unitary efficiency. The approach taken by this European consortium was quite different: what if we worked collaboratively with households to change practices, rather than people? Two consumption domains were identified: laundry and heating, with two associated challenges implemented in the last quarter of 2018. Across Europe, 300 households participated; with 36 households participating in Geneva.

For this talk, comparative results will be shared and discussed, for Switzerland and in relation to the other countries. We plan to share what makes the Living Lab approach stand out, and what learnings can be drawn for other forms of experimentation.