Distribución espacial de la población

The Pete Street program has relied on a short list of simple to use educational tools to engage various resident groups. Included in this short list are a Basic Energy Education (BEE) Workshop Leader’s Guide, a fully scripted written guide that a volunteer workshop leader can read from to facilitate one-hour basic energy education workshops. These BEE workshops have been the primary tool for engaging residents in the program. Within these hour-long workshops, residents are taught how their homes use and lose energy with a tabletop display board. The second part of the workshop engages residents in a bingo game that is designed to reinforce and enhance their understanding of home energy use. In addition to the BEE Leader’s Guide there are guides for training community volunteers, manuals for how to manage a community energy education program, a detailed manual used by the trained volunteers to conduct hands-on workshops, as well as a guide for neighborhood leaders that describes how to get neighborhood residents interested in attending and learning about home energy use. All of the Pete Street materials were developed with the idea that local program managers would want to customize the tools to fit their local needs and partnerships, although providing a complete package was also an objective. In fact, a number of communities have used the materials just as they were provided, right out of the box, so to speak, to launch a program quickly and without extensive administrative cost on program design.

The initial strategy of the Pete Street program was to rely on face-to- face learning opportunities and the exchange of information between

neighborhood residents in many informal ways. For that reason, and the fact that initial design work began as early as 2006, social media applications, and even a web-based platform for the program were not anticipated. Today, many utility and community-based energy efficiency programs take full advantage of online and social media applications. Some of these applications use normative social influence—framing the desired energy saving practices as common, socially desirable, and already being done by neighbors, friends, and similar social groups—to help encourage energy savings behaviors (Mazur-Stommen & Farley, 2013).

There are also a number of privately developed social mobile applications that provide incentives for reducing energy waste. JouleBug (http://joulebug. com) is one such application. It is a mobile social energy sustainability game where people can record the activities they do to save energy. Examples include using public transportation, using reusable water bottles, and buying clothes from a thrift store. For each activity, the user gets points. At the end of each period, the app informs the user how much money he or she saved. The app encourages users to compete with friends and family on Facebook and Twitter to see who can save the most money. Users can keep up with the activities of other users.

Another is Oroeco (http://www.Oroeco.com), a web-based application that rewards users for making low-carbon-impact actions in all aspects of their lives. It tracks users’ climate impacts by assigning carbon values to users’ purchases, home energy use, and food and transportation choices, letting users see the impact different actions and choices have on their carbon footprint. The app tallies users’ carbon imprint using scientific data, and users can see how they compare with others online.

Utilities offer a variety of behavior-based programs through online sources. Most have energy saving tips and how-to video links on their customer engagement pages. Many provide normative social comparison information in their mailed utility bills, separate monthly communications (home energy reports), or customers’ personal online account pages. Utilities also routinely offer social media communication options through Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and blogs where customers can interact with each other and company staff.

So how do we bridge the gap from Clean Energy Durham’s Pete Street program, which relies on face-to-face communications between neighbors, to approaches that take full advantage of today’s social media options? Would development of an online version (or e-books) of the Pete Street leader guides and training products, with more emphasis on self-directed learning, increase

the reach and impact of the approach without losing the advantages inherent in the neighbor-to-neighbor approach?

We suggest that ample benefits could be derived from development of an online version of the Pete Street program. This could take the form of a series of videos covering topics such as how to lead a basic energy education workshop in your neighborhood, or hosting a hands-on workshop for your neighbors, as well as specialized how-to videos instructing how to install a programmable thermostat, applying weatherstripping to doors and windows, or how to hire a home performance contractor. A website platform that communities could use to track participation, schedule workshop sign-ups, and catalogue resident energy upgrades following participation would be very beneficial. The website could also provide opportunities for identifying and linking to program sponsors and allowing communications between participants to foster more social interactions. Sponsor links on such a site open up considerable opportunities for expansion of incentives for participation. Retailers could be approached to provide coupons for participants or even in-store locations for workshops.