Household energy resilience: Shifting perspectives to reveal opportunities for renewable energy futures in affluent contexts
Journal article, 2022

Energy resilience is an important focus for energy policy and research, since the energy system is increasingly facing challenges such as power shortages, e.g. due to increased renewable energy production, and risks of power outages caused by extreme weathers. Typically, energy resilience in these contexts focuses on infrastructure and securing supply of electricity despite disturbances. This paper contributes a complementary perspective on resilience, which takes households as a starting point for investigating resilience. Building on understandings of resilience from several disciplines, we suggest a definition of household energy resilience that can be used to explore how households can ensure a good life in a future with variable availability of electricity. Furthermore, we draw on current ideas of future domestic energy use in energy affluent contexts (backup energy sources, energy efficiency, flexibility, and energy sufficiency) to create a framework for exploring household energy resilience. We find a potential for diversity within and between the different ideas, that is not always present in mainstream visions of future energy use. With the perspective of household energy resilience, we wish to challenge the perception of electricity demand as non-negotiable and to reveal opportunities for supporting households in becoming more resilient in an uncertain future.

Demand-side flexibility

Energy futures

Sufficiency

Energy resilience

Renewable Energy

Households

Author

Hanna Hasselqvist

Chalmers, Industrial and Materials Science, Design & Human Factors

Sara Renström

RISE Research Institutes of Sweden

Helena Strömberg

Chalmers, Industrial and Materials Science, Design & Human Factors

Maria Håkansson

RISE Research Institutes of Sweden

Energy Research and Social Science

22146296 (ISSN)

Vol. 88 102498

Designing Everyday Energy Resilience

HSB Living Lab, 2019-12-01 -- 2022-04-15.

Swedish Energy Agency (49807-1), 2019-12-01 -- 2021-12-31.

Driving Forces

Sustainable development

Subject Categories

Design

Social Sciences Interdisciplinary

Energy Systems

Areas of Advance

Energy

Infrastructure

HSB living lab

DOI

10.1016/j.erss.2022.102498

More information

Latest update

2/7/2022 9