On the road to a sustainable society in which demand for electricity continues to grow, the built environment in the Netherlands faces a major electrification challenge. We need to use electricity more flexibly, intelligently and efficiently. Flexibility arises when the use or generation of electricity can be varied over time, by both consumers and businesses.
The objectives of GO-e are to demonstrate whether and how flexibility can be an alternative to upgrading the electricity grid and to develop system solutions and scalable flexibility services to ensure sufficient flexibility is available in the built environment in the future.
The goal is to encourage citizens to change the moment of their energy usage. Eg. Postponing charging their EV, heating their heat pump. Also we would like them to use as much of the electricity they produce with their solar panels. Large-scale flexibilisation of our electricity consumption can only succeed if end users participate on a large scale. Therefore we need to know what drives people, which barriers they experience and what triggers could be used so that people will change the moment of their energy usage.
This project is being carried out with a Top Sector Energy Subsidy from the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy, implemented by the Netherlands Enterprise Agency.
Case study profile
Introduction
During this project, the authors explored whether citizens are willing to provide flexibility in their energy usage, and what motivates them to do so.
Behavioural insights
People were asked with the help of an experience sampling tool (brief questions during their daily lives) whether they were prepared to provide flexibility at that specific moment in time. If so, they indicated why they were prepared to do this.
The study explored 4 different values and their impact on how willing people were to supply flex:
Biospheric values
Egoistic values (financial incentives)
Hedonic values
Altruistic values
Outcomes and impacts
Respondents are very willing to supply flex. In 80% to 92% of situations in which flex could be unlocked, respondents are willing to supply flex. However, these percentages of flex unlocking are not currently feasible in practice because not all participants in this study own or use all assets (heat pump, PV, EV, or home/neighborhood battery).
The egoistic value (financial rewards) is the most frequently chosen main reason for providing flex. The amount of the reward or savings has little to no influence on the willingness to provide flex. Biospheric value is, after egoistic value, the second most important motivation. Altruistic value has the least influence on the willingness to provide flex.
The insights can be used by DSO’s and energy providers for the design of flexibility services.