Energy systems integration and psychology: Where do we start?

In order to adequately address climate change while simultaneously meeting society’s energy needs, sustainable energy systems can account for the changing energy landscape and increasingly overlapping roles of energy consumers and producers. Energy Systems Integration (ESI) is an innovative, holistic approach to designing and engineering sustainable energy systems that optimizes the modern diverse and multifaceted energy landscape (Kroposki, et al., 2012). The purpose of this presentation is threefold: 1) define ESI for an audience that will be critical to its success but may be unfamiliar with this approach to sustainable energy systems (environmental psychologists); 2) present interdisciplinary qualitative research which identifies key dependent variables vital to ESI and how different key groups of people conceptualize and verbalize these outcomes; 3) identify avenues for future research potentially most crucial to implementing efficient and acceptable ESI. Successful ESI requires an integration of the macro and micro perspectives, taking into account not just the technical constraints of the power grid and the availability of conventional and renewable energy sources, but also embracing consumers as active contributors towards ESI. This requires a wide variety of changes for end-users; for example, the usage of energy sources in the form of solar panels transforms consumers into prosumers, who both produce and consume energy (Rickerson et al., 2014), altering end-user responsibilities. Effective and long-lasting incentive structures may be needed to encourage long-term engagement across multiple behaviors, such as changing energy carriers or the adoption of renewable energy sources and energy efficient use, monitoring and controlling energy supply and demand, and storage technologies. Moreover, end-users need to change patterns of their existing behaviors to adapt energy demand to supply (e.g., adjusting time of use to avoid peak usage hours or to match available renewable supply). Furthermore, ESI requires social acceptance and desirability of ESI-related infrastructure and policies (Steg, Perlaviciute, & van der Werff, 2015). However, end-users are typically under-informed about the energy system and do not know the various ways their energy behaviors impact the environment (Steg et al, 2015). In order to understand how individuals perceive and conceptualize ESI and effectively research the myriad of ESI-related outcomes, psychologists will need to understand the language with which individuals conceptualize and judge their role in the energy system. Additionally, in order to ensure ESI-related research is practically impactful, researchers must ensure that measures are constructed in ways that adjust to and complement the design of ESI. The presentation will detail a series of interdisciplinary, qualitative interviews with local academic and practicing technical experts, policy experts, environmental activists, and end users in the Netherlands. Key aspects of making precise and valid ESI-related measures include careful consideration to levels of abstraction, both in the geographic scale discussed and the wording used to describe the intended target measures. Additionally, we will explore differences in stakeholder and community member interpretations of ESI terminology as well as the perceived relative importance of the various factors in achieving sustainable ESI. Key avenues for future ESI psychological research will be discussed.