We are pleased to announce that our study on “Exploring the impact of network tariffs on household electricity expenditures using load profiles and socio-economic characteristics” has been published in Nature Energy.

Price structures in the electricity sector are currently in flux as a result of digital technology advancements that provide the power grid with distributed energy. To ensure a sustainable and economical use of alternative energy, it is necessary to understand the impact that price variation has on end-consumer consumption behaviour.

Cornelia Ferner and Dominik Engel from the CSE, together with experts from the Energieinstitut Linz studied consumer behaviour by evaluating the impact of different price structures on consumption patterns, using smart meter electric power consumption data from 765 Austrian households. Applying data analytic methods, the researchers showed that the consumption behaviour of households with lower income was more affected by daily price fluctuations. Another contributing factor is that lower income households do not have the resources to purchase programmable energy saving appliances and thereby reduce their peak electricity demand.

• V. Azarova, D. Engel, C. Ferner, A. Kollmann, and J. Reichl, “Exploring the impact of network tariffs on household electricity expenditures using load profiles and socio-economic characteristics,” Nature Energy, vol. 3, p. 317–325, 2018.
  [Bibtex]

  @article{Azarova18a,
  Abstract = {Growing self-generation and storage are expected to cause significant changes in residential electricity utilization patterns. Commonly applied volumetric network tariffs may induce imbalance between different groups of households and their respective contribution to recovering the operating costs of the grid. Understanding consumer behaviour and appliance usage together with socio-economic factors can help regulatory authorities to adapt network tariffs to new circumstances in a fair way. Here, we assess the effects of 11 network tariff scenarios on household budgets using real load profiles from 765 households. Thus we explore the possibly disruptive impact of applying peak-load-based tariffs on the budgets of households when they have been mainly charged for consumed volumes before. Our analysis estimates the change in household network expenditure for different combinations of energy, peak and fixed charges, and can help to design tariffs that recover the costs needed for the sustainable operation of the grid.},
  Author = {Azarova, Valeriya and Engel, Dominik and Ferner, Cornelia and Kollmann, Andrea and Reichl, Johannes},
  Doi = {10.1038/s41560-018-0105-4},
  Isbn = {2058-7546},
  Journal = {Nature Energy},
  Title = {Exploring the impact of network tariffs on household electricity expenditures using load profiles and socio-economic characteristics},
  Url = {https://doi.org/10.1038/s41560-018-0105-4},
  pdf = {http://rdcu.be/ISbU},
  Year = {2018},
  volume = {3},
  pages = {317--325},
  }