UK Energy Lab: A feasibility study for a longitudinal, nationally representative sociotechnical survey of energy use

This feasibility study into establishing a nationally representative longitudinal panel of energy use in the UK was commissioned jointly between the UK government Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) and the UCL Centre for Energy Epidemiology (UCL CEE) at the UCL Energy Institute (UCL EI) with the UCL Department of Science, Technology, Engineering and Public Policy (UCL STEaPP), working in partnership with the NatCen Social Research (NatCen). The study came about following the publication of ‘Developing DECC’s Evidence Base’1 in January 2014, which identified the need for better data about people, technologies and buildings to inform energy policy. The aim of the study was to explore the feasibility of setting up a process of long-term, nationally representative data collection that could meet this need. The details of the scope of this process are set out below. Here we set out the background reasoning for why exploring the feasibility of large-scale data collection is an important step in the process of exploring how to get better data into energy policy.