Our task
Smart Grid, Smart City Customer Research Findings
Arup | Energeia | Frontier Economics | Institute for Sustainable FuturesIndustry Forum28th July 2014
Customer Survey
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Survey Background
• All customers using product for > 1 month contacted
• Survey via email and phone, in Aug 2013 & Feb-Mar 2014
• Surveyed 47% of eligible trial participants
• Sample sizes Survey Responses
2013 1,710
2014 (repeat respondent) 994
2014 (new respondent) 1,505
TOTAL 3,215
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Survey Background
• Expect some degree of self selection bias in results:
• Trial participants signed up by choice
• Respondents to survey may be those more engaged
with their product and interested in giving feedback
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Customer Priorities
Customers with in-home displays engaged with their energy data much more frequently than those with portals
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Product Interaction
Customers with in-home displays engaged with their energy data much more frequently than those with portals
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Actual vs Perceived
And increased engagement with feedback data DOES actually correlate with higher energy and peak savings
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Product Interaction
But when paired with HAN, Portal can be a powerful tool for bill reductions, despite lower frequency of engagement
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Product Interaction
The more energy data was provided to customers, the more they wanted – very few people felt overloaded with information
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Product Impact
Trialled products increased customer energy awareness, control over consumption & ability to reduce bills … but not all customers ‘convert’ awareness to bill reductions
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Product Impact
Tariff & Technology
Products
Tariff only, Technology only
Products
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Product Impact
• Changes to routine generally did not involve substantial change to people’s daily routines (left)
• Self-reported implementation of behaviour change ‘decays’ over time, but not markedly (right)
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Product Impact
• Expect lower – but not insubstantial – consumer demand reduction on extreme temperature days
• Suggests peak prices more effective than rebates for delivering critical peak day reductions
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Vulnerability Analysis
Financially vulnerable HHs were more willing to shift load, more satisfied with their products and felt more empowered to reduce bills
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Vulnerability Analysis
• Elderly: older households were less likely to engage frequently with the product, obtain the benefits and derive satisfaction, but having a lower income (e.g. pensioners) offsets some of this ‘age effect’.
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Vulnerability Analysis
• Children: Increases the likelihood of the household feeling ‘bill pressure’; limited clear behaviour change difference (slightly higher load shifting); but improved likelihood to recommend.
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Product Type Analysis
• Incentivise or inform: Products combining feedback technologies with a tariff/rebate consistently improved customer outcomes across a range of indicators.
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Product Type Analysis
• e.g. Ability to reduce bills – average score of +0.2 represents clear trend
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Product Type Analysis
• Tariff Type: Peak event products (rebate and tariff) outperformed others across a range of indicators, but BudgetSmart also popular
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Product Type Analysis
• Carrot or stick: Rebate customers thought they saved more (below) but tariff customers actually saved more (Frontier)
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Change Over Time
• Product Satisfaction: Remained steady or improved for 90% of respondent households.
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Future Research
• Dataset available on ICH• Multivariate analysis to isolate the influence of
specific variables on indicators• More cross-question analysis• Greater diversity of extreme peak event
conditions• Choice modelling to interrogate competing
priorities (price vs reliability)
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Questions