Residential consumer preferences to demand response : Analysis of different motivators to enroll in direct load control demand response

Abstract

Demand Response (DR) is a potential tool to help reduce the network and market stress with the ever-increasing renewable energy in the electricity system. This study aims to measure the different motivators of residential consumers towards Direct Load Control (DLC) DR to identify the influence of socioeconomic and demographic characteristics on the DLC DR motivators. To study this, we examined the preferences of Finnish residential consumers to DLC DR. The analysis from consumer responses resulted in the following findings: Firstly, the cluster analysis identified three distinctive consumer subgroups. Secondly, a multinomial-logistic regression provided the influence of gender, education, living conditions and income level on the consumer subgroups. Thirdly, a Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) showed the effect of age group, presence of children and number of people in the household on the subgroups. Finally, an ANOVA test provides the influence of consumer characteristics on the DLC DR motivators. The results highlight the heterogeneity of different subgroups and the influence of consumer parameters on DLC DR motivators. The findings of this study have novel and practical implications for energy flexibility among residential consumers. The policy implications arising from this study are discussed which are essential to consider for widespread adoption of DR.