Experimental Design
【Survey 1】
In conjunction with a Web-based research company, we surveyed monitors to obtain household demographics such as gender, age, and income of household members and their use of home appliances. The survey was conducted online through a Web-based research company. At the beginning of the study, we asked them for their consent to participate in this research experiment. Only those who consented to participate will be included in the following experiments. In addition, we will pay a reward to the participants of the experiment for their participation in this survey and the following experiments and surveys.
[Experiment]
We randomly divided the monitors of a survey company (3,300 households) that obtained consent to participate in the experiment in Survey 1 above into four groups. Details of each group are as follows.
1 Untreated group:
No intervention.
2 Opt-in treatment group 1 (Real Time Pricing; RTP):
For those consumers who choose to take the treatment, we offer a price equal to wholesale at every hour of the day (24 frames), reflecting the previous day's price.
3 Opt-in treatment group 2 (variable Critical Peak Pricing; v-CPP):
For those consumers who choose to take the treatment, we offer peak and off-peak prices dependent on the previous day's wholesale price.
3.1 If the wholesale price is less than 40 yen, peak and off-peak prices will be 30 yen.
3.2 If the wholesale price is between 40 yen and 62.5 yen, the peak price will be 50 yen, and the off-peak price will be 17 yen.
3.3 If the wholesale price is 62.5 yen or more but less than 87.5 yen, the peak price will be 75 yen, and the off-peak price will be 17 yen.
3.4 If the wholesale price is 87.5 yen or more, the peak price will be 100 yen, and the off-peak price will be 17 yen.
4 Opt-in treatment group 3 (Time-of-Use; TOU):
For those consumers who choose to take the treatment, we offer the peak price at 50 yen and the off-peak price at 17 yen, independent of the previous day's wholesale price.
We will obtain participants' electricity consumption data (HEMS data: July-August 2023) for the event period and the pre-event period through the monitoring company; HEMS data is electricity consumption measured at 30-minute intervals in each household through smart meters installed in each household.
Participants will be eligible to receive DPs for seven days, from August 22 to 25 and August 29 to 31, 2023. Participants assigned to each treatment group, excluding the untreated group, will be notified in advance of the event period, intervention details, and payment terms for rewards, and will each choose whether or not they wish to receive the treatment. Participants in each treatment group are then notified of the price schedule for the following day by the evening before each event date.
The payment terms for the rewards in this experiment are as follows: the difference between the payment during the event period calculated at the base price (30 yen per kWh) and the payment during the event period calculated at the DP realized in each treatment group will be the reward due to electricity savings (maximum: 2,000 yen). However, suppose the difference between the payment during the event period calculated with the base price and the payment during the event period calculated with each DP is negative. In that case, the reward for electricity saving will be zero.
[Survey 2]
For those assigned to the untreated group or the treatment group that did not opt-in for each DP, we will survey them if they are home or not home on a particular day (September 10 and 11). We will reward respondents with 300 yen for this survey.