Materializing energy

Motivated and informed by perspectives on sustainability and design, this paper draws on a diverse body of scholarly works related to energy and materiality to articulate a perspective on energy-as-materiality and propose a design approach of materializing energy. Three critical themes are presented: the intangibility of energy, the undifferentiatedness of energy, and the availability of energy. Each theme is developed through combination of critical investigation and design exploration, including the development and deployment of several novel design artifacts: Energy Mementos and The Local Energy Lamp. A framework for interacting with energy-as-materiality is proposed involving collecting, keeping, sharing, and activating energy. A number of additional concepts are also introduced, such as energy attachment, energy engagement, energy attunement, local energy and energy meta-data. Our work contributes both a broader, more integrative design perspective on energy and materiality as well as a diversity of more specific concepts and artifacts that may be of service to designers and researchers of interactive systems concerned with sustainability and energy.

[1]  William W. Gaver,et al.  Design: Cultural probes , 1999, INTR.

[2]  I. Woodward Understanding Material Culture , 2007 .

[3]  Eli Blevis,et al.  Sustainable interaction design: invention & disposal, renewal & reuse , 2007, CHI.

[4]  Ronald Paul Hill,et al.  Highways and Buyways: Naturalistic Research from the Consumer Behavior Odyssey , 1992 .

[5]  Kenneth M. Keating,et al.  Energy and Society , 1988 .

[6]  Khai N. Truong,et al.  Breaking the disposable technology paradigm: opportunities for sustainable interaction design for mobile phones , 2008, CHI.

[7]  Tony Fry A new design philosophy : an introduction to defuturing , 1999 .

[8]  Phoebe Sengers,et al.  Reflective design , 2005, Critical Computing.

[9]  Eli Blevis,et al.  Understanding why we preserve some things and discard others in the context of interaction design , 2009, CHI.

[10]  Susan Schultz,et al.  An Integrative Review of Material Possession Attachment , 2004 .

[11]  Eli Blevis,et al.  Energy aware dwelling: a critical survey of interaction design for eco-visualizations , 2008, OZCHI.

[12]  Rebecca E. Grinter,et al.  Getting to green: understanding resource consumption in the home , 2008, UbiComp.

[13]  Anton Gustafsson,et al.  STATIC! The Aesthetics of Energy in Everyday Things , 2007 .

[14]  P. Devine‐Wright Energy Citizenship: Psychological Aspects of Evolution in Sustainable Energy Technologies , 2007 .

[15]  V. Zelizer Culture and consumption , 2010 .

[16]  Russell W. Belk,et al.  Possessions and the Sense of Past , 1991 .

[17]  Robert Bruce Lindsay Energy: Historical Development of the Concept , 1976 .

[18]  Patricia A. Urban,et al.  Networks of Power , 2011 .

[19]  A. Borgmann Technology and the character of contemporary life , 1984 .

[20]  Don Ihde,et al.  Technology and the lifeworld , 1990 .

[21]  Ron Wakkary,et al.  A sustainable identity: the creativity of an everyday designer , 2009, CHI.

[22]  Johan Redström On Technology as Material in Design , 2005 .

[23]  John Zimmerman,et al.  Research through design as a method for interaction design research in HCI , 2007, CHI.

[24]  Tony Fry,et al.  Design Futuring: Sustainability, Ethics and New Practice , 2008 .

[25]  P. Verbeek What Things Do: Philosophical Reflections on Technology, Agency, and Design , 2005 .

[26]  Johan Redström,et al.  Switch! Energy Ecologies in Everyday Life , 2008 .

[27]  James A. Landay,et al.  The design of eco-feedback technology , 2010, CHI.

[28]  Elliot Aronson,et al.  Energy use: the human dimension , 1986 .

[29]  David Elliott Energy, Society and Environment (Second Edition) , 2003 .

[30]  David N. Pellow,et al.  Handbook of Environmental Sociology , 2003, Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research.

[31]  Eric Paulos,et al.  Home, habits, and energy: examining domestic interactions and energy consumption , 2010, CHI.

[32]  Eric Paulos,et al.  Home, habits, and energy , 2010 .

[33]  S.W.K. van den Burg,et al.  Comfort, Cleanliness and Convenience; the Social Organisation of Normality , 2004 .

[34]  Anthony Dunne,et al.  Design Noir: The Secret Life of Electronic Objects , 2001 .

[35]  P. Verbeek,et al.  What things do , 2005 .

[36]  Yolande A. A. Strengers,et al.  Smart metering demand management programs: challenging the comfort and cleanliness habitus of households , 2008, OZCHI '08.