“Energy visualization” as a tool to influence the energy use in a municipality kitchen

Panel: 1. The dynamics of limiting (energy) consumption

This is a peer-reviewed paper.

Authors:
Gireesh Nair, Umeå University, Sweden
Erik Eklund, Umeå Municipality, Environmental and Health Department

Abstract

In Sweden, municipalities’ own and operate the kitchens that cook food for pre-schools, schools and the elderly care facilities. There are 68 kitchens in the municipality of Umeå and providing feedback to the kitchen staff on energy use could facilitate them to reduce the energy use in these facilities. Accordingly, an “energy visualization” project was initiated in one of the kitchen: Nordstjärnan, which is a newly built kitchen equipped with separate meters for appliances that continuously record the energy use.

For the “energy visualization” project, a visualization design software called “Siemens Control Point” is used. The software is integrated with the existing steering and control system and connected to almost all sensors/meters in the building.The electricity use data from the kitchen was collected for 5 months prior to installation of the “energy visualization” project to establish a base line for the energy use. The average electricity use is referred in this paper as “Electricity budget”, which is calculated for each kitchen appliance that has an electricity meter.

A trial was started in the kitchen from December 2018 onwards, wherein a display unit was designed to project the electricity use of the kitchen. The display unit, which is a large television screen, has different “slides”. For example, one of the slide is modelled to energy labelling. The energy labelling in the display has a rating from A+++ to D, which is calculated continuously based on the daily electricity use and the electricity budget. If the kitchen uses more electricity than budgeted then the rating will drop, and if the electricity use is less than the budget then the rating will increase. Furthermore, depending upon the energy performance of the kitchen the visualization screens also display “smileys” which are used as injunctive norms.