Aberdeenshire Staff Wanted For Household Energy Monitoring Project

Researchers at the Macaulay Land Use Research Institute are looking to recruit Aberdeenshire Council staff for a large scale household energy research project.

The project, led by the Institute’s Dr Tony Craig in partnership with Planning and Environmental Services at Aberdeenshire Council, has been designed to understand the effectiveness of energy monitors in raising awareness of household energy consumption.

Participating Aberdeenshire Council employees will be able to monitor their household energy consumption via an in-home display. Levels of energy use, awareness and any reductions in energy use from the adoption of this system will be compared to reduction levels measured from the adoption of other technological innovations, including online feedback and individual appliance plugs.

The project, which aims to recruit over 1,200 people in total will be one of the biggest studies of its type and will allow participants to see how much electricity is being consumed by a particular electrical item over a defined time period. "It is one thing to know how much energy a fridge uses at any given moment, but it is another thing to know how much is used within a week or month," explains Dr. Craig.

He goes on to say, "This project will allow us to study not only how energy is used over time within households, but also how different household types use energy in particular ways. The combination of energy data and questionnaire data make this project particularly interesting and we hope that this project will give people a genuine opportunity to learn more about how they use energy in their houses, and that this will result in last behavioural change."

Participants should register their interest at: macaulay.ac.uk/energy/

Published on 30 June 2010 in Climate, water and energy