Trying On Transitions: Experiential approaches to energy engagement

In this talk I will discuss a selection of projects aimed at enabling people to engage more meaningfully with unfamiliar aspects of energy transitions. These include a peer‑to‑peer energy trading board game (Watts the Deal?), a “test‑drive” simulator for heat pumps (pump:chic), and an online tool that shows when electricity is cleanest for activities like baking (Should I Bake?). I will describe how these tools were developed through iterative, user-centred design approaches, and how they have been adopted by our team and external organisations for teaching, research, and public engagement. I will also introduce the Beyond Individual Persuasion project, a collaboration between researchers in human-computer interaction, anthropology, and energy studies, to explore collective action in the context of energy. Again, methods were employed that aim to make abstract energy systems tangible, support experiential and/or social learning, and enable people to try out decisions and roles they likely don’t encounter in everyday life. Based on this work, I argue that tools which foreground hands‑on exploration and social interaction can surface mental models, challenge assumptions, and open space for forms of individual and collective agency that purely informational or discursive approaches may fail to support.

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Host or Publisher Harriet Thomson, University of Glasgow