Celia Leo (FASS), Ho Chih Young (FoE), Ng Jing Hui Darrell (FoE), Parkhi Agarwal (FASS), Yeong Jing Wei (FoS)
Academic Advisor: Ms. Sadaf Ansari
Energy consumption, while vital to our modern day living, is a source of many environmental problems such as the burning of fossil fuels, which in turn produces vast amounts of carbon dioxide that contributes to climate change. Statistics indicate that several developed countries face the problem of unsustainable energy consumption, but the cause remains unclear in spite of ample publicity, education and established measures to curb energy waste. At an individual consumer level, it is posited that the crux of this issue lies in behavioural psychology, particularly in the field of habit formation. Our project aims to identify the key reasons behind unsustainable electrical consumption behaviour at Ridge View Residential College (RVRC). We will be conducting this through a randomly selected pool of respondents. The first step in the project is to survey the sample resident population on their current electrical use and their justification for their habits. The second step is to study their daily usage habits in-depth, in the form of logbooks to better pinpoint the exact challenges participants face in practicing responsible energy usage and mitigate inaccuracy of answers in the survey stage of the experiment. Finally, from the data collected, solutions fitting the current dynamics of the target population to combat irresponsible energy usage can then be crafted with greater effectiveness.
Keywords: Energy, Energy wastage, Responsible Consumption, Consumer habits