Linking our Energy Use with Climate Change and Renewable Energy

Today we continue our energy use behaviour blog by looking first at more statistics from around the country and second by presenting the ideas on energy policy put forward by the public all across Ireland.

27% of Irish people believe that their energy use does not impact on climate change

20% of Irish people do not understand their electricity bills

45% of Irish people think that their energy use has great significance on Ireland's electricity demand

33% of people either don't know or think their energy use has no impact on demand.  

 

The above results seem to lead to the conclusion that the level of understanding of the electricity and energy systems and supply chain is very low.  If relevant, clear and easily understood information was provided, it is likely that people would be more willing to be more efficient in their energy use.  This is borne out by the policy suggestions provided by the public in this study:

 policystuggestiongraph.png

The top three suggestions as can be seen in the above graph are:

  1. Grants
  2. Incentives/Bonus for reduced use
  3. Information provision

Typically speaking the grants that were suggested related to energy efficiency actions such as insulation, boilers etc.  However, these types of grants ARE available from SEAI but the study showed that the level of knowledge and uptake of these grants is quite low.

Knowledge of the Warmer Homes Grant can be seen in the chart below.  This covers work that is done for households that meet set criteria both in income and house type, age etc.  The work is carried out free of charge.  The only imposition on householders is that they need to vacate the premises for two or three days while the work is underway.  Incredibly, in general people don't want to have the work done according to the operators of the scheme in the NW of Ireland.  This will be addressed in our next blog - Are Irish People Too Happy to be Energy Efficient?

 warmerhomegrant.png

Also in our next blog - more stats, more policy suggestions and commentary from The Rural Policy Hub.