Energy and People Conference in Oxford

The Environmental Change Unit at Oxford and UKERC Meeting Place organised an excellent conference 20-21 September. It kicked of with an illuminating and very funny opening lecture by Elizabeth Shove on different ways of conceptualising energy and people: attitudes/behaviour/choice (ABC) or systems of provision and infrastructure or social practices - no prizes for guessing she favoured the latter although her main message was to be aware of your theoretisation and argue for it. Amongst the multiple workshops, I chose the communities and energy one for the first day. We heard about a new complexity based project from Leeds, the work of the HCA and (an impromptu but excellent mini-talk) the PACE scheme from USA which is the model for the UK Green Deal (but coming out of the private not the public sector). There was a reality check about energy crises in Ghana and environmental justice and energy in the UK, details of the UNLOC project from Surry and some interesting ideas on reflexive governance from Denmark. But the community theme did not seem to be where the core interests of this conference lay. Despite Elizabeth Shove's opening cautionary words about the ABC approach, the behavioural theme raised the most interest in the workshops I attended. The one on energy behaviour in non-domestic buildings and in urban development was very lively with talks on the role of investors, tenants, lawyers and letting agents in shaping this behaviour (ECI), identification of different pathways in zero-carbon housebuilding (Manchester) and the impact of Green Building Councils worldwide (Maastricht). The Green Gauge Trust provided warnings about the lack of capacity in the refurb market and ECI identified that this market was worth £28 b.p.a. of which about 45% could be oriented towards low carbon retrofit, an interesting figure to ponder.

From the Planning Research Conference

Energy was not a big theme at the Planning Research Conference recently held at University of Birmingham, but there were a couple of papers of interest. The EPSRC CALEBRE project was highlighted. This looks at retroffiting 'hard to treat' housing stock and one conclusion was strongly emphasised: the lack of skills in the UK SME sector. Loss of insulation at service entry points was often exacerbated by retrofitting and poor installation of energy saving equipment sometimes led to higher energy consumption. Their research showed that consumers are worried about poor workmanship and on this basis they are right! One way forward is for local authorities or NGOs to work on a neighbourhood or street basis and monitor work standards as part of their procurement role.
Another interesting paper came from Germany and looked at cooperatives. Apparently two new energy cooperatives were opening every month in Germany last year. These organisations have climate protection written into their founding charters and can be used for a variety of urban development projects. One advantage is that such cooperatives can access finance, both public and private. An example can be found at www.moeckernkiez.de.