Phil's skills

What have I learned? A playful graph of my skills and passions, created to help me identify next steps.

Learning to predict peak demand

Clustering load profiles is tricky. Even 'similar' high-resolution use patterns have little overlap, if they are slightly shifted in time. This paper applies a novel clustering approach for cumulative load profiles. Random forests walks identify explanatory variables for high peak time demand using our activity data.

Activity categorisation

Participants can report over 200 different activities. Here is a Sankey diagram to show how we categorise activities into larger and smaller subgroups.

Lockdown in winter - The Conversation

The timing of he first lockdown was fortunate. The heating season had just ended and the weather was lovely. A winter lockdown brings new challenges for energy.

Explore the electricity use patterns of UK households. Which has the greater impact on demand: children or dogs? Power explorer.

The gender divide in energy

Many energy models assume that women are responsible for more energy use than men. They do more housework after all. Our data challenges this assumption. While women do indeed report a higher number of household chores, their electricity demand appears to be lower. Find out what they do differently in this open access publication.

Example of a household profile

We created a new and simplified version of the household profile for participants. This one is suitable for mobile phones as well. We also added a feature to download your personal data as a csv file for your personal use. Here is a sample

The Trust Gap

Less than half of UK citizens are happy to share location data for better heating control, and only 20% want to share it with their energy utility company. Smart solutions require more trust. Energy Research & Social Science.

The lockdown blog - early findings

Read how energy and activities have been affected by the lockdown in our guest blog at Joju Solar.

Chat with Oxford Sparks

Oxford Sparks communicate Oxford Science to the wider public. Here we talk to them about our work on energy use during the lockdown. YouTube

Changing rhythm

This is how lockdown affects the electricity grid. What used to be a regular weekly pattern (high demand during weekdays, low at weekends) has broken down. Variability is a challenge for system operators and forecasting demand is just as important as forecasting renewable generation.

Gardening and recreation increase enjoyment

Since the lockdown started we see more reporting of screentime, gardening and hot drinks. Washing/showers, work and (surprisingly) reading are down. Perhaps we should read more, given that it appears even more enjoyable, especially compared to screentime.

Response to COVID-19 lockdown

The activity patters we observe have changed dramatically. On average the day starts an hour later, more activities are reported in the morning and significantly fewer during the peak demand period in the early evening. This may have profound impacts on the timing energy use.

Reduction in demand

UK electricity demand has fallen. In a historic context this reduction is roughly equivalent to the last 6 years worth of energy savings. Thanks to sunny and windy weather, the emissions of our energy use are among the lowest we have ever seen. How much of this reduction can be sustained into the future?

How are we coping?

For some the lockdown is easy to cope with, others face serious difficulties. Help us understand these unusual times and learn about potential long term effects at JoyMeter.uk

Oriel News

A short article about the opportunities arising for energy research under lockdown.

Lockdown changes energy use

We continue to collect data during the lockdown. While national demand is at a record low, some households will see their bills go up.

Visit to Stanford

Phil visited Hilary, June, Chad and many others of our collaborators at Stanford. It is great to see our tools in use in America.

Energy and Behaviour

Our findings about enjoyment and electricity use are now available in book form. See the chapter 3.1.

The Grid Edge Revolution

A white paper about the transition from centralised systems to one with lots of Ds: decarbonised, decentralised, digitised, democratised, and decoupled energy use and services. Get the White Paper.

Keep calm and have a cuppa

This paper uses regression techniques to pinpoint which activities cause most electricity demand. Here is a surprise: even though having a cup of tea requires energy, having a hot drink slows us down enough to result in a net reduction during that hour. Next time we face a blackout, have a tea and read the paper (Open access).

Osney reduce by 18%

Osney island excelled in our energy challenge. When asked to reduce demand between 5pm and 7pm, they achieved a record 18%!

Data available for research

A record of Meter data and documentation is kept by the UK Data Service. DOI: 10.5255/UKDA-SN-8475-1

BBC Radio Wales

Breakfast radio interview on the Climate Emergency - includes some good news, too.

The (social) value of flexibility

Talk at the 2019 UKERC conference about some of our findings on YouTube

Machine learning from daily life

Daily life and demand - using regression techniques to understand which activities best explain our demand for different times of day. Energy Efficiency

Das METER

METER launches in Germany. The University of Münster has developed their own electricity recorder and now uses the Meter App in German. We are excited to see how UK and German demand compare...

2019 Winner

Luiza joins Finlay and Penny as winner of a year free electricity. You can win by taking part.

Get the App

Our activity recorder is now available for anyone as JoyMeter

Get it on

Tea or supper?

When we ask people to use less electricity in the evening, they cut down on hot meals and have a cup of tea instead.

16% demand reduction

We can get a 16% reduction in electricity use, just by asking.

The happiest activities

Among the most enjoyable activities are sleeping, reading and socialising. These also use very little electricity.

West Oxford Street challenge winner

Riverside and Oatlands Road have won the West Oxford challenge by reducing their demand the most between 5 and 7pm.

Protecting data privacy is key to a smart energy future

A collaboration with Carissa from Philosophy (!). We spell out why trust is crucial for data sensitive approaches. Read more

Innovation Award

The Vice Chancellor of the University of Oxford, Prof Louise Richardson, awarded Meter a high commendation in her Innovation Awards for our "Interdisciplinary study of energy use and activities". The overall winner is literally saving lives with Smart Handpumps

The footprint of household activities

One cannot simply assume that certain activities lead to higher electricity use. Read why

Daily life and demand

Dwelling and appliance variables can explain 46% of average electricity use. Can we do better? Read the paper

Flexibility, dynamism and diversity in energy supply and demand

How can we be more flexible (and why do we need to)? Read the paper

2018 Winner

Finlay wins a year free electricity. Congratulations!

Aven joins the Meter team

With Aven we gain an expert in machine learning, who will help us find patterns in our activities and electricity use

Reaching a 1.5C target

Socio-technical challenges for a rapid transition to low carbon electricity system. Read the paper

Activity data published

Activity data presented at ECEEE conference in France

Meter Reading

We reached 16 million electricity readings (4500 hours worth) and our participants have recorded nearly 6000 activities. Read our Meter Reading

Browse the data

Explore household profiles

No more paperwork

The new app is now in use to make recording activities easy and fun.

We have a winner

Penny W. from London has won one year free electricity. Sign up now for a chance to win yours.

Data Scientist appointed

Marina Diakonova has joined the Meter project. Her background in complexity science will help us in analysing the relationships between activities and electricity profiles.

Meter Reading

Over 6 million electricity readings and the first 1000 activities have been collected. Read more

Jessica turn diaries to data

Jessica has been a great help this summer coding up diaries and improving the app

Adriano optimises our devices

Adriano made some great advances in how we configure our the devices we send to you

Power People Animation

This delightful animation explains why understanding our energy use matters for cheaper, safer and cleaner energy.

Win a year free electricity

Lucky participants now have the chance to get their electricity paid for a year. Find out how

Beautiful new eMeters

The new eMeters are ready! Much nicer and smaller design - with simple instructions for how to fit them to your electricity meter.

Select Committee

Dr Grunewald gives evidence to the Energy and Climate Change Select Committee hearing on Low carbon network infrastructure.
See evidence session.

Expert workshop

30 leading UK experts meet in Oxford to give advice on METER research.
Documents

More publications

Available on Academia.edu/PhilGrunewald