This collaborative research and training project aims to examine household energy use behaviour as a basis for co-designing interventions for sustainable consumption in South Africa and Ghana.

A key sustainability challenge relating to cities is unsustainable energy consumption by the residential sector, which in turn, results in energy insecurity, high energy expenditure and energy poverty especially for low income households, and broader negative environmental impacts. In addressing cities’ energy security and environmental targets, improving the efficiency of household energy consumption is considered an important component of energy conservation strategies. The project will consider households’ current energy use practices, factors influencing these practices and potential interventions for promoting energy-savings.

Such information can be used by local municipalities, utility service providers (e.g. ESKOM) and decision makers to target areas and behaviours that need change to manage energy demand and promote economic and environmental sustainability. The project forms part of a broader global city resilience efforts centred on bottom-up demand response mechanisms aimed at balancing energy supply and demand for energy sustainability. In this project ‘energy’ refers to electricity.

Last Modified: Tue, 07 Jan 2020 12:52:15 SAST