Design of an appliance level eco-feedback display for domestic electricity consumption

Abstract

Over the past decade there has been an increased focus on eco-feedback systems for electricity consumption due to emerging technologies that allow detailed and real-time usage data to be collected and presented to users. In this paper, we present the design of an always-on eco-feedback display, PowerViz, that provides information about people's power usage in their homes at an appliance level. In our study, we found that PowerViz increased awareness towards energy consumption, gave householders a better understanding of high consumption devices and made it easy for them to isolate and respond to unnecessary or "greedy" appliances by turning them off or changing their use patterns. We also found that an ambient display of the household's total current electricity use both informed and attracted people to use the system when power usage became unusually high.