Australian Householders

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Australian Householders Attitudes Towards
Sustainability in the Home
Profs Bond Newman
This research was supported under Australian
Research Council's Discovery Projects funding
scheme (project DP0985410). The views expressed
herein are those of the author and are not
necessarily those of the Australian Research
Council.
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Sustainability in the Built Environment

• Australia produces the highest GHG emissions per
  unit of GDP in the world!
• Buildings account for around 25-30

Australia
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Focus on Residential

• Nearly 75 of spending on buildings over last 5
  years have been on dwellings
• 55 construction of new dwellings
• 45 alterations additions to existing
  dwellings over 10,000
• Improving energy efficiency of buildings is the
  quickest most cost effective way of reducing
  GHG emissions

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GHG emissions energy use in homes
Source Australian Greenhouse Office 2008
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Draft National Strategy on Energy Efficiency
2009-2020

• ? stringency of energy efficient requirements in
  the Building Code of Australia from 2010
• Phase in mandatory disclosure of energy
  efficiency in buildings

Homes BCA 6 minimum by 2011 Hot-water systems lighting new efficiency requirements
Incentives, rebates, grants e.g. Green Loan program (on hold), water tanks, PV, Solar HW
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Cost as a barrier

• Common argument against going green is that it
  costs more than a comparable conventionally
  designed building or home
• Developers look to minimise capital costs
  continue to provide buildings that are cheap to
  build but expensive to operate

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Literature Review

• Barriers to uptake of renewable energy in homes
  (Environment Victoria, 2009)
• lack of consumer information when buying
• split incentives between builders the
  householders builders are not motivated to
  improve the energy efficiency of homes as they do
  not re-coup the benefits
• upfront capital costs of EE measures
• bounded rationality householders may not
  understand the benefits to them of energy
  efficiency, or may not act due to other priorities

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Literature Review

• A 2007 survey of 1700 households showed
• Public consciousness is very high - 90 agree
  climate change is a major problem for the
  planet
• More than half have electric water heaters
  criticised for contributing to GHG emissions
  highest energy use in homes
• Up to 20 are unwilling to undertake any
  sustainability improvements because of trouble or
  expense
• 35 are willing to be persuaded if the savings,
  cost ease of installation are attractive enough

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Literature Review

• Survey reported by ABS (2006) showed
• Adoption of environmentally friendly behaviours
  is greatest where it is convenient where it
  does not require a lot of time or money
• 43 said they considered cost to be the main
  factor when buying a new white good
• 44 said energy rating was main reason
• Only 11 of households stated an environmental
  factor as their main concern

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Research Aims

• Determine lifestyle choices size of home,
  construction, facilities household size
• Determine householders motivation to reduce GHG
  emissions in the home
• Identify explain user behaviour in residential
  buildings in relation to the energy consumed

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Methodology

• Survey residents in 5 largest cities by
  population
• Sydney
• Melbourne
• Perth
• Brisbane
• Adelaide
• Survey posted to 1250 residents
• Response rate 6.5 (n85)

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Survey Results

• Motivation to reduce personal climate change
  emissions
• 49 moderately motivated
• 32 highly motivated
• Choice of house size
• 35 live in 3 bedroom home 35 4 bed
• 52 have 2 bathrooms
• 52 have 2 living rooms
• In line with ABS data that shows that the
  average home has grown to 258m2.

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Survey Results

• Household size
• 43.5 have 2 persons
• 20 have 3 persons
• National average 2.6 persons/ household
• This trend to smaller household sizes larger
  homes presents a barrier to reducing impacts on
  the environment
• Air Conditioning
• 73 have air-con (ABS 2006 figures shows AC use
  has doubled in 14 years)

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No/Low Cost Actions

• Over 50 of respondents were already taking many
  of the listed actions
• The actions they were most likely to take
  replacing 10 of the most used light bulbs with
  LED or CFLs turning off all appliances at the
  wall when not in use avoiding halogen
  down-lights
• The actions they were least likely to take
  installing timers on appliances to turn them off
  when not in use insulating hot water pipes
• Given listed actions are low/no cost it was
  surprising more people would not act

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Reasons for not taking action

• Inconvenience
• They forgot
• Too lazy
• This information can provide useful clues of what
  is needed to encourage people to act, for
  example
• automating actions where possible
• making actions mandatory or part of the BCA (dual
  flush WCs low flow taps etc)

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Low/medium Cost Actions

• Over 50 of respondents were taking action on
  only 5 out of 17 listed actions
• The most common actions already taken replacing
  single flush toilet with dual flush installing
  or topping-up ceiling insulation externally
  shading any exposed western or eastern windows
• Given that 42 of heat escapes through the roof
  that heating /cooling consumes the most amount of
  energy, installing insulation is one of the more
  cost-effective ways of reducing energy
  consumption

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Low/medium Cost Actions

• It is surprising with rebates available for
  installing insulation that the take up of these
  has not been higher
• Similarly, water heating uses 25 of energy in
  homes but creates the most GHG emissions
• Only 38 had installed instantaneous gas or solar
  hot water heater yet this is another
  cost-effective way of reducing both energy
  consumption and GHG emissions while saving money
  rebates are available

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Low/medium Cost Actions

• The actions they were least likely to take
• installing double glazing
• installing a photovoltaic system
• switching to Green Power
• installing a smart meter
• more information is needed about these
• Help consumers see where, how when they use
  energy better informed how to adjust their
  consumption habits in order to save on power
  bills

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Reasons for not taking action

• Cost was the major reason not to act
• Given that there are rebates available in many
  States it would seem that
• Either the respondents were not aware of the
  rebates, or
• They are not informed about the benefits of many
  of these actions particularly in terms of overall
  savings in energy costs, where payback periods
  can be quite short

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Benefits motivations for acting

• 1. Cost savings gt 1000 p.a. were considered the
  most important
• doing the right thing
• achieving healthy indoor air quality
• increased property value
• decreased obsolescence
• Cost savings benefits are reported most widely in
  the media in relation to acting environmentally

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Respondent Demographics

• Age Gender
• 62 were male
• 61 were over 60 years of age (much higher than
  National average gt65 years is 13.5, ABS 2009)
• Thus, survey responses are not likely to be
  representative of the population as a whole
• Common issue with postal surveys those with more
  time tend to respond (older, retirees)

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Respondent Demographics

• Location
• 28 were from South Australia
• 24 from Western Australia
• 20 from New South Wales
• 15.5 from Victoria
• 13 from Queensland

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Ongoing Issues

• There is limited information available to
  consumers about the costs benefits of
  retrofitting to make homes more sustainable
• This has been identified as a barrier to the
  uptake of sustainability in homes
• Generally consumers want to know
• the cost of installing a feature
• the cost savings from having it
• the associated payback period
• better able to make informed decisions

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Ongoing Issues

• Type of information required, an example
• The cost to install a 1kWh photovoltaic system is
  12,000
• With the available rebate of 8,000 it would take
  15 years to payback this feature
• The consumer would save, on average
• 250p.a. in energy costs
• 1.83 tonnes of GHG emissions

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Ongoing Issues

• Other little known facts
• Appliances draw electrical power (3 of a homes
  energy use) if turned off (but not off at the
  wall) or on stand by
• Some of the largest drawers of energy are
• audio-visual equipment,
• VCRs,
• printers,
• computer notebooks

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Summary Conclusions

• A 2009 survey of householders attitudes towards
  willingness to act environmentally
• Barriers to energy efficiency in homes are
• larger homes smaller households
• costs long payback periods of sustainable
  features
• lack of consumer information about benefits
  savings from incorporating sustainable behaviours
  features

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Summary Conclusions

• Common reasons people are not acting in more
  sustainable ways
• inconvenience
• laziness
• Given that water heating heating cooling of
  homes use the most energy produce the most GHG
  emissions these areas should be focused on
• According to IEA a total global switch to
  compact fluorescent bulbs would deliver CO2
  savings slightly over half of the Kyoto
  reductions!

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