Design to reduce energy use in the home. Innovating the user experience. Research, Personas and Scenarios

1. Topics:
Research
Personas
Scenarios

2. RESEARCH
RESEARCHMETHODS
• In-home interviews
• Behavioral observations
• Written and photographic documentation
RESEARCHOBJECTIVES
• What we saw
• What we learned
• What it means
• What we can do

3. PERSONAS
Boomers Gen-Xers Gen-Yers
Jessica Amy
Energy
Attentive
John
Sue Jake
Energy
Passive
Cody

4. PERSONAS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
JOHN: ENERGY ATTENTIVE
“I try my best to be efficient with energy,
but there’s often a battle between saving
and keeping Sue comfortable.”
SUE: ENERGY PASSIVE
“Now that I’m home more, I usually just set
the thermostat to what I need in order to
stay comfortable.”

5. PERSONAS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
JOHN: ENERGY ATTENTIVE
• John pays the bills
• Average payment plan
• Hang dries laundry to save
• Maintains HVAC air filter
• Fireplace user in winter
• Wants long term results

6. PERSONAS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
SUE: ENERGY PASSIVE
• Doesn’t pay attention to the bills or cost of energy
• Often leaves lights on
• Sets thermostat for comfort; feels she deserves it at her age
• Thinks CFL’s look strange and are too expensive

7. PERSONAS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
“We’re not planning on relocating,
so it’s worth it to invest in our home.”
• Empty nesters; spends weekends at lake
• Well insulated house with newer windows
• Have landscaping lights on a timer
• Thermostat:72 in summer and 68 in winter
• Used gov’t rebates for Energy Star appliances

8. PERSONAS
GEN-X: JESSICA&CODY
JESSICA: ENERGY ATTENTIVE
“I can hear our on-demand hot water
heater click on. It reminds me that we have
some control over our efficiency practices.”
CODY: ENERGY PASSIVE
“Jessica gives me a hard time about the
utility bills. I’m working on it, but our
technology is pretty important to us. We
don’t do well with turning off or unpluging
desktop computers.”

9. PERSONAS
GEN-X: JESSICA&CODY
JESSICA: ENERGY ATTENTIVE
• Attempts to teach their son, Ben, by constantly reinforcing
household rules to turn things off when finished
• Pays close attention to the utility bills
• Often attributes increases to the cost to actual cost of delivery,
rather than their usage

10. PERSONAS
GEN-X: JESSICA&CODY
CODY: ENERGY PASSIVE
• Active and likes to spend time outdoors
• Usually the one to take their dog for walks
• Tries to shut down lights and fans but sometimes forgets
• Doesn’t pay much attention to the thermostat — wants comfort

11. PERSONAS
GEN-X: AMY&JAKE
“We schedule our thermostat to be most comfortable
between 5-9pm, the rest of the time it is about efficiency.”
• Have a 3 year old son; 1 dog
• Live in a 3 bed/2 bath suburban home
• Florescent bulbs everywhere
• Keep a big basket of blankets in the living room in the winter.
• Back door has a draft, they roll a towel up in front of back door
to keep the heat inside.
• They adjust thermostat for dog in summer

12. PERSONAS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
AMY: ENERGY ATTENTIVE
“Those boys will only recycle if I basically
do it for them and make it easy to drop
things in. I swear they wouldn’t even get the
bills paid if I wasn’t here.”
JAKE: ENERGY PASSIVE
“I really want to save energy, benefit the
environment, and my bank account, but
sometimes it just doesn’t fit my schedule.”

13. PERSONAS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
AMY: ENERGY ATTENTIVE
• Responsible for keeping track of all bills
• Collects money from all the roommates
• She sets up and empties recycling containers for the home
• Pays the most attention to the electricity used in their home

14. PERSONAS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
JAKE: ENERGY PASSIVE
• TV and gaming systems always on
• Keeps an old small refrigerator in his bedroom for sodas/beer
• Habitually opens window in his room when the heat is on
• His room seems to be warmer than the rest of the house

15. PERSONAS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
“It’s difficult to control the electricity usage
when roommates are always leaving things on.”
• Lights often left on unintentionally
• Either A/C or heat is always on
• Multiple gaming systems stacked up by the television
• Not everyone understands how to use prorammable thermostat
• Live close to campus and frequently have guests coming and going
• Cost of utilities and all household bills are split 3 ways

16. SCENARIOS
Boomers Gen-Xers Gen-Yers
Jessica Amy
Energy
Attentive
John
Sue Jake
Energy
Passive
Cody

17. SCENARIOS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
After having their Smart Meter and new
thermostat installed, John and Sue find
out they could be saving money by
programming their thermostat and paying
closer attention to their energy usage.
However, they are out of town a lot and
don't have much time to worry about
their thermostat.

18. SCENARIOS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
John turns on the thermostat
for the first time and goes
through the set-up wizard,
and alert settings (including
the monthly bill limit).

19. SCENARIOS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
John turns on the thermostat
for the first time and goes
through the set-up wizard,
and alert settings (including
the monthly bill limit).

20. SCENARIOS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
After he's finished entering
the settings, John starts the
programming feature.

21. SCENARIOS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
He finds out that he can
create specific settings for
home, away, and vacation
modes.
Sue is especially excited
about the vacation mode,
because every time they go
out of town, John sets the
thermostat for extreme
temperatures and she can't
keep her plants alive.

22. SCENARIOS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
A week later, John notices
the status bar on the home
screen is yellow.

23. SCENARIOS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
He presses a button on the
status bar and a pop-up
shows that his current
usage pattern will cause him
to exceed his monthly bill TIP!
Get back on track
limit; the pop-up says that he by turning the
thermostat down
can get back on track by 2 degrees.
turning the therm down 2
degrees, with a button to
press to approve therm
change.

24. SCENARIOS
BOOMERS: JOHN&SUE
He presses OK, and the
status bar goes back to
green.

25. SCENARIOS
GEN-X: JESSICA&CODY
Jessica and Cody schedule their
thermostat to be most comfortable
between 5-9pm, the rest of the time
it is about efficiency.
Their programmable thermostat helps
Keep the temperature ranges constant and
prevents them from forgetting to adjust
when needed.

26. SCENARIOS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
Jake and Amy are college students living in
an old drafty house.
Amy comes home from her evening
waitressing job, sits down at the kitchen
table and counts her tips. After she
discovers that she barely has enough
money to buy groceries for herself for the
week, she tries to take her mind off of
things by opening the mail.
”The electric bill is $149! What are those
boys doing in this house? What can I do?"

27. SCENARIOS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
She goes to the thermostat
and sees the status bar is
red.

28. SCENARIOS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
She then presses the
Charts/Graphs icon to look
for clues about what is
causing the bill to be high.

29. SCENARIOS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
She sees the week
comparison and notices
energy use is much higher 60
50
than last week. 40
30
20
10
0

30. SCENARIOS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
She rolls over to the year
comparison and sees
energy use is also much 300
250
higher than last year; 200
150
she realizes she had energy 100
conscious roommates last 50
0
year and attributes this to the
higher bill.

31. SCENARIOS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
Then she goes to the
program mode and sees the
weekday mode has been
turned off and only weekend
is on, when the thermostat is
set much more comfortably
for lots of company.

32. SCENARIOS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
She immediately turns
weekday mode back on.

33. SCENARIOS
GEN-Y: AMY&JAKE
When she finishes,
the home screen shows
a yellow status bar.