EMPOWER

Lead Research Organisation: University of Warwick
Department Name: WMG

Abstract

EMPOWER's mission is to integrate creative, empathic user-centred design techniques with genuinely novel product design innovation. The current problems are that:(i) users feel disengaged with the bland, utilitarian, and non-user friendly design of many existing energy control and feedback interfaces which could impact upon their general disengagement with energy efficiency; (ii) users are not aware of the connections between their decisions and energy use; and(iii) designers do not know enough about user behaviour in the context of energy usage. There is a gap in the market for novel and exciting, beautifully designed, high-end energy control and feedback interfaces. EMPOWER's workpackages will begin with ethnographic workplace studies of users' interactions with energy and decision making processes within the client's offices within the UK. The use of techniques such as observation, interviews and 'think-aloud' verbal protocol analysis will drill down into detailed user insights, energy decision heuristics and users' mental models. These insights will underpin a series of highly iterative and novel participatory design workshops within workplaces, whereby the project team co-design solutions with building users, and stakeholders including facilities managers and policy makers. Rapid, iterative prototyping of concepts will allow in-context trials with users. The outcomes of the workshops will then drive the product development process. The final outcome will be an innovative user-driven energy efficiency product, which can be commercially exploited beyond the end of the project. The EMPOWER project is supported by More Associate's 'CarbonCulture' behaviour-change delivery and research platform and an ongoing collaboration with major policy-making organisations.

Publications

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Description EMPOWER focused on reducing the CO2 emissions of workplaces through connecting staff with energy data, and their own behaviour, in more engaging ways, via a digital platform. This has now been launched commercially as CarbonCulture.



A collaboration between More Associates, Design at Brunel University and WMG at the University of Warwick, EMPOWER benefited from DECC's offices in Whitehall as a pilot site. The project developed More's nascent 'CarbonCulture' energy monitoring platform into a suite of web apps, a user dashboard, blog, visualisations and physical touchpoints designed to engage staff in understanding the energy and carbon impacts of everyday behaviours and practices.



DECC aims to lead by example; technical improvements led to 21% CO2 reduction in 2010-11, but further improvements will come in part through behaviour change. The aim of the pilot was to achieve a high level of staff engagement-measured by repeated use of the platform-demonstrating effective methods of engaging employees in caring about the part their behaviour plays in CO2 emissions, both as a precursor to behaviour change, and to increase buy-in to relevant building operation changes.



The project partners have expertise in user-centred design and behaviour change for social benefit, including energy monitors, sustainable design, healthcare experiences and development of the Design with Intent toolkit, a cross-disciplinary pattern library. In EMPOWER, elements of this expertise were applied as part of a participatory design methodology, involving DECC staff in development through workshops and prototyping.



Funded through the TSB's Low Impact Buildings Innovation Platform, this was a commercial project, led by More Associates, with Brunel and Warwick providing research expertise and deriving academic insights from the work-using the platform as a research tool, as well as engagement with staff at DECC and elsewhere to investigate design techniques for engagement, mental models of energy systems, interaction heuristics with technology, and thermal comfort.



Following ethnography, participatory activities, carbon footprinting, and background research (including contributions from all project partners), key areas of staff behaviour were identified to address through CarbonCulture's combination of digital and physical interventions, including:



- encouraging staff working late to move to a single floor

- encouraging staff to eat lower-carbon lunches

- logging commuting transport choices

- involving staff in assessing thermal comfort

- providing information on CO2 impact of business travel



'Apps' were paired with physical touchpoints (e.g. loyalty cards for lunch choices), available via a dashboard presented as part of the DECC intranet. All apps offered users points for logging particular actions, redeemable for prizes; a 'social proof' ticker showed users the actions their colleagues were taking.



Publicly available electricity and gas visualisations-both near-realtime and summary data-connected staff directly to building performance and seasonal changes, enabling conversation with facilities management. The introduction of gas data visualisation at DECC enabled 20% daytime gas savings to be identified.



400 of 1,000 DECC staff joined CarbonCulture, comparing very favourably with other employee engagement schemes. Of those, 160 maintained engagement over three months, using apps and logging actions. Insights from the pilot are being incorporated into the platform, including tailored versions for new clients. Other government departments-including Number 10-have also signed up for elements of CarbonCulture.



More launched CarbonCulture publicly in late 2012, with a blog and a DECC-endorsed report including sections authored by Dan Lockton, the Brunel/Warwick researcher on EMPOWER. Academic outputs include papers published and in preparation on interaction heuristics, engagement strategies and mental models of energy.
Exploitation Route Allow building owners to create sustainable working environments for their employees.
Sectors Construction,Creative Economy,Digital/Communication/Information Technologies (including Software),Energy,Environment