When Space Heating Becomes Digitalized: Investigating Competencies for Controlling Smart Home Technology in the Energy-Efficient Home

Abstract

In the near future, renewable energy sources (RES) will make up an increasing share of energy production in the district heating grid, implying that utilities must enable energy flexibility in order to compensate for the intermittent nature of RES. Current initiatives rely on smart approaches, encouraging a flexible energy demand by integrating various demand-side-management technologies. While praised for their ‘smart’ capabilities, smart home technologies have also been criticized for not meeting their potential in terms of savings and flexibility. This paper examines space-heating practices in everyday life in 16 Danish households. The study relies on qualitative in-depth interviews and ‘show and tell’ tours within these homes. Results show how space-heating practices are reconfigured by embodied knowledge related to respectively space-heating and use of smart technology. This implies that occupants’ adaption to smart home technology is reconfigured by their previous experiences as well as the meanings they ascribed to their practices. By showing the different ways in which occupants ‘get to know’ smart home technology, results highlight forms of embodied knowledge which occupants habitually draw on when they heat their homes. Occupants learn and carry competences for conducting space heating throughout life, and interventions aimed at enabling a flexible energy demand need to consider this. As smart home technology is integrated in homes, interventions should consider embodied knowledge as part of occupants’ competences for controlling smart home technology, as this will impact the reconfiguration of (new) space heating practices.

Renewable Energy Acceptance by Households: Evidence from Lithuania

“…Scholars have shown in their studies the correlation between awareness about renewable energy and willingness of households to adopt it [66][67][68]. Ulkhaq et al [68] analyzed the consumer preferences of renewable energy sources in their homes.…”

Technological fascination and reluctance: gendered practices in the smart home

“…Without the necessary competences, living in a smart home can be challenging and time-demanding and lead to frustration and feelings of inconvenience (Hargreaves et al 2018;He et al 2019). When people lack interest and refrain from learning how to use the technologies, the properties of the technologies are left unused and people tend to perform workarounds (Wright 2019;Larsen & Gram-Hanssen 2020).…”

“…Heating is seldomly associated with fun and gadgets, but rather considered as something that should just work smoothly in the background, providing comfort and not require too much interaction, as has been shown in studies on heating practices and technologies (e.g. Larsen & Gram-Hanssen 2020;Madsen 2018). The SHT set-ups with various devices, on the other hand, require more work as the devices need to be integrated in order to function together.…”

Living in an Active Home: household dynamics and unintended consequences

“…Yet, it has been argued that trivialising the role of chore-doing is problematic, given housekeeping entails decisions that impact national energy infrastructure (Johnson 2020). This failure to account for the gendered nature of everyday domestic practices may mean that residents do not engage with smart home technologies in ways that designers have anticipated, affecting their performance (Larsen & Gram-Hanssen 2020). Whilst smart homes may differ from Active Homes in certain respects, in the wider context of accelerating household interest in battery storage, electricity sharing and trading, and demand-response opportunities to better use the electricity they generate (Strengers et al 2021), these innovative housing developments may further align in future.…”