Energy informatics for behavioral change: Increasing the participation rate in an IT-based energy conservation campaign using social norms and incentives

Behavior change has been identified as an important determinant to curb energy consumption. In this context, information and communication technology (ICT) and especially feedback instruments can provide a significant contribution by motivating behavior change on a large scale. Yet, related smart meter pilot projects often fail to produce the hoped-for energy saving effects—mostly as they fall short in motivating an initial adaption and recurrent usage of the technology. In order to overcome this problem, we describe and empirically test a scalable and cost efficient solution that uses elements from behavioral sciences to motivate people to initially adapt and continuously use the technology provided. The approach draws on social normative feedback and externally emitted incentives. In the energy informatics domain, there is a big gap in the understanding of the effects of these elements, which is crucial to improve the overall effectiveness of programs. Therefore, we empirically investigate how these mechanisms motivate initial participation in an ICT based program to reduce in-home energy consumption. We conducted our study in a real world setting with a sample of 17,500 customers of a Swiss utility. Our findings show that participation heavily depends on the motivational mechanisms used. Therewith, targeted messages could enhance program participation rates by up to 45 % and dramatically increase the overall impact with no additional costs.