Flora Bowden

Powerchord: Towards ambient appliance-level electricity use feedback through real-time sonification

Feedback on energy use mainly uses visual, numerical interfaces. This paper introduces an alternative: energy sonification, turning real-time electricity use data from appliances into ambient sound. Powerchord, a work in progress prototype developed through co-creation with householders, is detailed.

Participatory Drawing in Ethnographic Research

The chapter reports on a participatory drawing research study conducted by the Royal College of Art within the SusLabNWE project. It sought to explore people’s notions of energy and to visualise their ideas and associations relating to it. The study is framed within the context of the broader ethnographic research tools that were employed by the SusLabNWE consortium. The study was conducted in three phases with visitors to the Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design’s Life Examined exhibition at the Royal College of Art in September 2013; with students participating in the UK ArtScience Prize at The Silk Mill, Derby in April 2014; and with visitors to the Victoria and Albert Museum Digital Design Weekend in September 2014. Participants were offered drawing materials and asked to respond to the question: What does energy look like? In this chapter we discuss the outcomes of the research process, we analyse the images that were created and we explore what they tell us about the participants’ ideas about energy and what this could mean for energy visualisations.

Powerchord: Exploring Ambient Audio Feedback on Energy Use

Influencing energy use is a major research topic. However, many approaches lump ‘energy demand’ together, disconnected from everyday artefacts, the realities of household life, and people’s diverse understandings of the systems around them. There is an opportunity for research through design which addresses relationships with the invisible concept of energy through new kinds of feedback. Powerchord is an ongoing (2014—) exploration of sonifying energy use in near-real time. The prototypes developed so far monitor multiple household electrical appliances in parallel, turning readings of the instantaneous power being drawn into various kinds of sounds. Powerchord provides a form of ambient experiential feedback intended to fit with the soundscapes of everyday domestic life, while (perhaps) enabling a deeper understanding of the characteristics of energy use. The concept was developed from ideas suggested by householders during co-creation sessions as part of the European SusLabNWE project, funded by INTERREG IVB, as part of our wider exploration of the invisibility of energy which also led to ‘Drawing Energy’ (see Chap. 14 ‘Participatory Drawing in Ethnographic Research’).

Recruitment of Participants (Households in City District and Companies) for Insight Research and Prototyping

In the project SusLabNWE the integration of users in private households was a vital part of the concept and scientific approach because products and services need to be aligned to the user needs and fitted to their behaviour. In order to develop, design and implement innovative products that serve their purpose and are accepted by users, a high level of user engagement is expected. This chapter describes the recruitment of participants in two case studies within the SuslabNWE project.