The initiative aims to identify and increase the potential for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from the residential sector.

The project “Sociological elements of reducing emissions in the home through energy saving and efficiency”, launched by Friends of the Earth, aimed to identify and increase the potential for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from the residential sector through energy saving and efficiency in the home.

The first of the specific objectives of the project is to quantify the potential for reducing energy consumption in Spanish households, taking as a sample different houses from three of the climatic regions established by the IDAE: Atlantic (Galicia), Continental (Galicia, Madrid and La Rioja) and Mediterranean (Balearic Islands). To this end, samples have been taken in 150 homes, where energy consumption and the characteristics of the home have been measured and tenants have been advised in a personalised way.

In these households, references have been taken such as the attitude towards savings measures depending on the area, the type of household and the economic investment. A subsample of households in a situation of energy poverty has also been analysed with the intention of carrying out measures to save on their energy consumption.

To achieve this first objective, explanatory material has been developed, the tools to advertise the energy micro-audit services of households have been identified and the sample has been selected with statistical methods. In addition, homes have been visited for data collection, audits have been carried out and the data have been processed for the subsequent preparation of the report and sending it to political leaders.

The second of the objectives proposed by the project was to carry out a pilot study of households’ attitudes towards energy saving and efficiency in housing with the data collected in the sample of 150 case studies. To this end, a personalised energy action plan has been drawn up for each household.

The 150 energy audits carried out have made it possible to draw up 150 specific energy action plans for each of the participating households with three possible savings scenarios (base scenario without saving measures, scenario with savings measures at zero cost and scenario with maximum savings measures). In addition, the CO2 savings trend has been modelled according to each measure and the CO2 savings according to the economic return time.

The data collected has allowed the preparation of two reports: an executive report with the main conclusions and a more detailed one in which the study can be learned more in depth. It should be noted as a conclusion of the project that 100% of the audited households are susceptible to savings measures at zero cost, but it depends on the sociocultural level and the level of ecological awareness that are carried out.