Research project Sweden’s electricity system needs greater demand-side flexibility. This project examines how households perceive and adapt to evolving network tariffs and other signals for reducing peak demand. Using IHBI Lab experiments, behavioural modelling and agent-based modelling, it analyses equity, inclusion and support needs.
The project generates knowledge on how demand-response instruments affect everyday household life. After the nationwide requirement for effect-based tariffs was paused, the issue remains highly relevant: such tariffs are already used in some areas and new models are being developed. The results will support fair tariff design, targeted guidance and a socially sustainable energy transition.
Sweden’s continued electrification increases the need for an electricity system in which households can contribute to demand-side flexibility, especially during hours of high simultaneous use. Effect-based network tariffs are one example of instruments that can reduce peak demand, but the policy landscape is changing. In March 2026, the Swedish Government paused the nationwide requirement to introduce effect-based tariffs and asked the Energy Markets Inspectorate to develop a new model. At the same time, effect-based tariffs are already used in parts of the country, and the need for flexibility remains as electricity demand grows.
Against this background, the project investigates how diverse households perceive, interpret and adapt to evolving electricity network tariffs, price signals and other forms of demand response. The focus is not on one single tariff model, but on how flexibility signals can be designed and communicated in a fair and inclusive way. Households differ in daily routines, economy, digital skills, housing conditions, values and capacity to shift electricity use over time. The same signal may therefore be manageable for some households, but burdensome, difficult to understand or unfair for others.
The project combines controlled experiments in the Intelligent Human-Buildings Interaction Lab at Umeå University with behavioural analysis, persona development, LLM-supported decision narratives and agent-based social modelling. Participants encounter realistic flexibility and pricing signals in a virtual home environment where choices related to cooking, heating, charging and other electricity use are linked to perceived consequences for comfort, cost and stress.
Based on experimental data, the project develops empirically grounded household personas that capture differences in behaviour, perceived fairness, stress, comfort and adaptive capacity. These personas are then used in agent-based simulations to analyse which households can benefit from demand-side flexibility, which risk higher costs or reduced comfort, and what support measures may reduce unequal outcomes.
The project will provide a knowledge base for fairer and more inclusive design of tariffs, flexibility programmes and household-oriented energy advice. It contributes open models, structured datasets, persona profiles and prototypes for behavioural support that can be used by policymakers, grid companies, municipal energy and climate advisors, housing actors and researchers.
