The energy and monetary implications of the '24/7' 'always on' society

This paper reviews the trends in society, technology and energy demand of the past 30 years, together with the growth of the 'on-demand' culture. The '24/7' or 'always on' society can be defined as one where people demand--and generally receive--what they want 'now'. It has grown up in parallel with developments in information technology, which have produced the services needed to meet that demand. Larger numbers of appliances, resulting from greater affluence and disposable income, have increased energy use, despite energy efficiencies in other areas. While monetary factors suggest that changes brought about by the 24/7 society will generally be self-correcting at the macro-economic level, there will nevertheless be effects for individuals, such as potentially severe impacts on the fuel poor as electricity prices rise. We conclude with a view of future directions. As the 24/7 culture continues to grow, there is scope for designers and for information technology to manage and reduce energy consumption. This includes buildings, their services systems, and the mix of new technologies that will be deployed over the next 20 years or so, including the possibilities for data exchange and control at the interface between energy suppliers and consumers, coupled with greater understanding of the behaviour of the consumers themselves.

[1]  Herbert George Wells,et al.  The Shape of Things to Come , 1933 .

[2]  A.M.L. van Diepen.  Developments in household composition in Europe , 1998 .

[3]  J van der Wal.  Green Households? Domestic Consumers, Environment and Sustainability , 1998 .

[4]  H. Moll,et al.  Pursuing More Sustainable Consumption by Analyzing Household Metabolism in European Countries and Cities , 2005 .

[5]  W. McDowall,et al.  Forecasts, scenarios, visions, backcasts and roadmaps to the hydrogen economy: A review of the hydrogen futures literature , 2006 .

[6]  Masaaki Terano,et al.  Field experiments on energy consumption and thermal comfort in the office environment controlled by occupants’ requirements from PC terminal , 2007 .

[7]  Susi Geiger,et al.  Exploring night-time grocery shopping behaviour , 2007 .

[8]  Ruxu Du,et al.  Design of intelligent comfort control system with human learning and minimum power control strategies , 2008 .

[9]  Anibal T. de Almeida,et al.  Sensor-based demand-controlled ventilation: a review , 1998 .

[10]  Sajed M. Abukhader,et al.  The Environmental Implications of Electronic Commerce - A Critical Review and Framework for Future Investigation , 2003 .

[11]  Julie Jefferies,et al.  The UK population: past, present and future , 2005 .

[12]  Doug Houseman.  Smart metering: The holy grail of demand-side energy management? , 2005 .

[13]  C. Sanne.  Willing consumers—or locked-in? Policies for a sustainable consumption , 2002 .

[14]  J van der Wal.  Analysis of Household Metabolic Flows , 1998 .

[15]  Arthur L. Dexter,et al.  On the control of heating systems in the UK , 2005 .

[16]  L Reijnders,et al.  Energy effects associated with e-commerce: a case-study concerning online sales of personal computers in The Netherlands. , 2001, Journal of environmental management.

[17]  Klaus Fichter,et al.  Environmental Effects of E-Business and Internet Economy , 2001 .

[18]  Paolo Bertoldi,et al.  Tradable certificates for renewable electricity and energy savings , 2006 .

[19]  Elizabeth Shove,et al.  Changing human behaviour and lifestyle: a challenge for sustainable consumption? , 2005 .