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Details of Grant 

EPSRC Reference: EP/S03188X/1
Title: Energy Revolution Research Consortium- Plus - EnergyREV - User Influence Tools for Enabling Two-way Engagement with Smart Local Energy Systems
Principal Investigator: McArthur, Professor S
Other Investigators:
Darby, Dr SJ Devine-Wright, Professor P Gupta, Professor R
Researcher Co-Investigators:
Project Partners:
Department: Electronic and Electrical Engineering
Organisation: University of Strathclyde
Scheme: Standard Research
Starts: 01 April 2019 Ends: 31 March 2023 Value (£): 382,572
EPSRC Research Topic Classifications:
Sustainable Energy Networks
EPSRC Industrial Sector Classifications:
Energy
Related Grants:
Panel History:
Panel DatePanel NameOutcome
09 Oct 2018 ISCF Prospering from Energy Revolution Announced
Summary on Grant Application Form
User participation in smart local energy systems is imperative for their successful deployment, as affirmed by the 'consumer pull' approach to energy innovation promoted by the Prospering from the energy revolution (PFER) programme. However, many users rarely engage in energy markets/ demand response for reasons including market heterogeneity and regulatory constraints, novelty, demand inelasticity and lack of understanding. Energy feedback initiatives tend to offer unidirectional forms of engagement that adopt an information-driven approach with a focus on analytics and dashboards, although users may wish for more interactive engagement, sometimes with a community dimension, and there is some evidence of its effectiveness.

Communication and visualisation of local energy flows and interactions (of constituent vectors - electricity, heat and transport) can influence users if they move beyond one way flow of information with no power for negotiation, and instead enable users to understand themselves, their activities, resources and energy use in a more joined-up way; also to manage, directly or through delegation, their consumption, production and storage of energy, contributing to network and grid balancing at the same time as gaining value for themselves and their communities. The communication takes place most effectively through a combination of personal and technological interactions: person-person, person-technology, technology-technology.

The action-oriented approach adopted in this Plus project is designed to address the need to extend and strengthen user participation in energy systems at local level, and deepen the impact of the Core WP4.1 by using longitudinal local energy data to co-create a suite of smart tools that are trialled using inclusive approaches in two contrasting demonstrator (urban/rural) case studies using distributed energy resources.

Key Findings
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Potential use in non-academic contexts
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Impacts
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Summary
Date Materialised
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Organisation Website: http://www.strath.ac.uk