Environmental impact of PEAKapp – energy and CO2 emissions saved

The PEAKapp project is an energy efficiency project that aims to trigger tangible energy savings across Europe to contribute to global and European climate objectives. The PEAKapp team set out to reach this objective by offering household energy consumers in several EU countries to test an user-friendly smartphone and tablet app that connects to the smart meter, loads consumption data and has eight distinctive features supporting behavioral change. But how exactly can these energy savings be measured and how well did PEAKapp project do?

1. Savings from behavioural change: the Impact Assessment for the Energy Efficiency Plan of the European Commission sets out that savings of 20% of overall energy consumption can be achieved. These can come from a) information, communication and engagement, 2) economic incentives and 3) the administrative framework such as regulated static vs. dynamic energy prices. All these paramount channels are implemented in PEAKapp whereas the PEAKapp goes far beyond these studies. The PEAKapp system features innovative social networking and a gaming feature plus a state-of-the-art flexible tariff system.
2. Consumption reductions from flexible tariffs: though flexible tariffs are not primarily designed to save energy, similar pre-project field trials of (semi-)dynamic tariffs (static time zones tariffs, no load dependent variation) showed that households saved additional 2.5% and 2.6% (in Ireland and Austria) of their baseline energy consumption even when tariff information was displayed only through green and red stickers on the refrigerators. The far more advanced innovative real-time and messages-based system of PEAKapp that offers varying saving opportunities at various days and times, lead to the objective of load shifts of 10% of annual energy demand and that every kWh consumed during these periods results in only 25% of GHG emission compared to an average kWh of electricity.
3. Savings from synergies with smart homes: Considering that the PEAKapp adds fun, peer-interaction and monetary incentives to smart home building management systems, such increased engagement aimed to contribute to their efficacy. The assumption was an 2% increase in exploiting savings potentials when PEAKapp successfully motivates household owners to more frequent and comprehensive utilization.