Motivating Home Energy Action
Australian Greenhouse Office, 2002
Fact sheet 9 - Developing your plan
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Successful home energy action plans are the result of careful consideration and planning. Time spent in the development process will be repaid many times over during the life of the program.
To develop a successful home energy action program, managers must:
- understand the context of the program
- focus on the aims of the program
- decide what action to take
- decide what strategies will motivate action
- monitor progress and the results, and
- repeat the process.
Organisations or groups seeking to introduce a program should:
- strive for maximum credibility
- have a clear organisational structure
- develop a network of professional advisers, and
- form a community advisory committee.
THE EIGHT STEP PATTERN
This eight step pattern is the key to developing a successful program for your community.
Step 1 - Choose energy actions with the greatest opportunities
Technological change
- Take advantage of opportunities to improve the efficiency of a building, piece of equipment or set of appliances as technology improves.
Climate
- Some regions may offer greater opportunity for reducing energy use through energy actions.
High energy users
- Households using large amounts of energy offer greater potential for savings.
Householder appeal
- Focus on measures more likely to be adopted by homeowners, even if other measures may deliver greater energy savings.
Actual and not theoretical energy saving potential
- Theoretical energy savings may not correspond to savings in practice.
Identify partner organisations
- Some energy actions provide benefits other than energy saving alone. Team up with organisations which may be interested in your program.
Step 2 - Choose energy actions with long term potential
Some energy actions may save little energy in the short term, but may lead to greater savings later. Don't discourage householders from taking short-term actions. Once they've taken the first step, they are more likely to pay attention to energy information and take further action.
Short-term measures can become long-term winners.
Step 3 - Choose households to focus on
Understand the householder, decide who to target, and develop strategies appropriate for that group. Remember energy actions may have energy and non-energy benefits, such as added convenience or saving the householder time. Emphasise all of the benefits that interest your audience.
Step 4 - Develop a mix of strategies
Support strategies to motivate householders to action with other measures such as regulation and education. Using a mix of strategies works because:
- different strategies motivate different people
- different strategies motivate the same people in different circumstances, and
- combined strategies motivate more people and make it easier for them to take action.
Step 5 - Choose a monitoring strategy
Develop your monitoring strategy at the same time as the program to:
- allow the program to be fine-tuned as it is implemented
- allow lessons learned to boost the effectiveness of other programs, and
- avoid monitoring being seen as a threat.
Consider using more than one monitoring method. If a program will run over several years, a pilot program should be designed and monitored.
Step 6 - Set a program schedule
You may need to take into account:
- the timing of different program elements
- industry lead times, and
- the schedules of partner organisations.
Step 7 - Provide training
People developing, running and monitoring programs need to understand:
- the technology or measure being promoted
- the target audience
- the program goals
- the program design, and
- key program components.
Step 8 - Develop administrative systems
Administrative support will ensure the program proceeds smoothly and you can:
- manage relationships with participants
- process applications (if required), and
- deal with inquiries and potential complaints.
Step 9 - Implement your program
From here it's over to you. With the background knowledge contained in this series of fact sheets, sound research, preparation and planning, you're well on your way to Motivating Home Energy Action.
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