• Energy Research

Abstract In the context of climate change, global industrialised nations are grappling with transforming energy networks to support a low carbon future. Using an energy justice framework this work aims to understand holistic outcomes of one low-carbon energy network intervention: demand-side response enacted on domestic heat pumps. By exploring participants’ lived experience of a pilot project, from recruitment to installation and use, this work reveals how injustices were reduced, introduced and amplified. Choice, consent, cost, comfort, disruption, and control are highlighted as key aspects of interest when considering the distributive, procedural, and recognition implications of this domestic innovation. For a net reduction of energy injustices to be realised, we highlight the need for project designers to work in partnership with end users to optimise the benefits for the household and the electricity system. Whilst this is a UK study, the themes and findings are internationally applicable for interventions that aim to harness the flexibility of heating, the largest global energy end-use.

Abstract Domestic demand response – specifically, changing household electricity usage patterns in response to signals – is an increasingly important part of electricity system decarbonisation. Many forms of demand response exist and there is a live question of the most appropriate and fair way to design it, especially regarding which types of household can participate and how. Using secondary qualitative analysis of published trial documentation, this paper compares two UK based trials in low income households whose headline results – kW peak reduction - differed by two orders of magnitude. Using a framework based on flexibility capital, the contextual factors underlying these different peak reductions are examined, and these headline results are balanced against other outcomes of the trials. The analysis examines the technical and social sources of flexibility capital in each trial, who controlled this capital, and for whom it delivered value. This highlights questions to consider when designing demand response, such as to what extent participants should be expected to understand and actively participate, who should control their energy use and the spread of responsibility and liability across facilitating parties. We argue that critical reappraisals of existing evidence are necessary as the terms for consumer participation in the future energy system are being established. There exist important aspects and consequences of demand response that are overlooked if schemes focus solely on how many Watts can be shifted. This is crucial as governments, the private sector and a growing number of other parties test and implement different demand response strategies.

The transition to a digital, decarbonised, and decentralised energy system presents both risks and opportunities for the domestic consumer. Domestic ‘demand-side response’ (DSR), where household electrical consumption adjusts in response to external signals, has been envisioned in different ways with several trials demonstrating that DSR often has variegated and uneven consumer outcomes. This plurality of outcomes raises questions about the ‘winners’ and ‘losers’ of pursuing such policies and thus brings them into the realm of energy justice – a framing that seeks to understand the ethical implications of energy systems. This paper, based on an extensive review of current academic literature, evaluates the normative implications of DSR in relation to the eight principles of energy justice proposed by Sovacool and Dworkin (2015). Whilst there are several ways that DSR may create opportunities for furthering energy justice, there are also multiple risks of injustice, with much depending on how particular DSR programmes are designed and the presence or absence of sufficient policies to mitigate regressive outcomes. Further empirical research is required to better understand the conditions through which DSR can contribute to energy justice. We conclude by offering policy recommendations for those developing DSR or consumer protection policies related to DSR rollout.