Warsaw

Warsaw City Lab: how habits and behaviours impact energy use at the city level

Working with households to better understand how habits and behavioural changes can help Warsaw improve efficiency of energy use

City Lab research led by: the City of Warsaw and Kozminsky University

Our context

Warsaw is the capital and the largest city in Poland. Through its Green City Action Plan, the city has created a long-term sustainable development plan, with the goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and achieve climate neutrality in the city by 2050 at the latest.

Warsaw involves citizens in municipal decision-making. For example, during the first edition of Warsaw Civic Panel on Climate Change, which took place in November 2020, 80 randomly selected citizens voted for 49 recommendations related to energy efficiency and climate. All these recommendations will be implemented by the City of Warsaw in the coming years.

Warsaw helps its citizens to protect the environment through subsidies for retention reservoirs and devices, installation of renewable energy sources, as well as for replacement of obsolete stoves and boilers on solid fuel.

City Lab description

The SONNET City Lab in Warsaw focused on achieving energy savings by monitoring energy use in private apartments and providing those residents with personalised recommendations on everyday ways to reduce energy consumption. The experiment engaged a group of 11 apartments inhabited by 37 people, located in different districts of Warsaw.

Key learnings

  • Participants appreciated receiving regular energy reports, including information on their energy use and personalised energy reduction tips.
  • Participants suggested that an integrated programme or app in which all information on their energy consumption is compiled would be a more attractive tool than weekly energy reports.
  • Participants were open to the possibility of receiving alerts via SMS or email in case irregularities in their energy consumption were detected.
  • Participants expressed some concerns about privacy issues involved in real-time data collection, analysis, and transfer.

Read the Warsaw City Lab report here.

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