5.1 Constituting Demand

Rationale: This project integrates and evaluates evidence especially from Themes 1 and 2 of how energy demanding end use practices vary in terms of how they are enacted, when, where, and by whom. Particular attention will be paid to detailing the social distribution (in terms of age, class, location) of more and less energy intensive end use practices and characterising forms of societal synchronisation across these practices. This fundamental yet novel work will for the first time provide a map of contemporary demand in the UK organised around end uses practices. Project 5.1 focuses on the practical, policy implications that flow from seeing energy demand as an outcome of social practices that are varied, changing, and only accessible to some. Specific tasks will include producing and promoting new methods of analysing patterns of demand in ways that are relevant to future models and forecasting/scenario building techniques and capable of addressing demand in far more sophisticated and differentiated ways. We will integrate results from Themes 1-4 to deliver a more generic account of how and why areas of energy use and mobility intensify, stabilise and decrease. We will develop an empirically informed analysis of how systems of provision ‘constitute’ patterns of end use demand, and show how this might be used to reduce carbon emissions.