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This chapter will introduce three novel technologies demonstrated in Sino-Italian Green Energy Lab of Shanghai Jiao Tong University for the hot summer and cold winter climate zone.

Experimental and modeling works have been conducted on the application of these systems. A comprehensive review on the features of these novel technologies, their adaptability to local climate condition have been carried out, and some initial study results have been reported.

Solar PV direct-driven air conditioner with grid connection, home used small temperature difference heat pump, smart house energy information and control system are appropriate energy technologies with reduced CO₂ emission, which can be applied efficiently in the hot summer and cold winter climate zone. More useful data will be obtained in the future demonstration tests in Sino-Italian Green Energy Lab.

This work shows combining renewable energy technologies and information technologies is crucial to improve the energy efficiency and the comfortableness for indoor environment.

Purpose – The UK energy market is in a period of significant transition, with a target of cutting carbon emissions by at least 80% by 2050. There is widespread agreement that the current policy landscape needs to change if this ambitious target is to be achieved. However, the current business structure also requires a radical overhaul. This chapter explores the new business models that are being introduced to serve commercial and domestic customers.

Methodology/approach – This chapter presents a case study of the UK energy sector that draws on the first author's active engagement in the UK's energy market and thus participant observation. The discussion is framed around relevant material from the entrepreneurship and innovation literatures, with a particular focus on entrepreneurial opportunities created by policy.

Findings – In a rapidly changing policy environment, new ideas, technologies and business models are emerging. A range of new business models evident in the market are explored. These include new forms of service delivery, market-making models and finance models.

Social implications – The chapter highlights the importance of entrepreneurship and innovation in the delivery of a low-carbon economy. It also explores the role of policymakers in promoting more environmentally sustainable approaches in this industry sector.

Originality/value of chapter – The chapter presents a novel, industry-specific case study. It contributes to extant knowledge on sustainable business through its focus on the complex interaction of policy and entrepreneurship as well as some of the business models required for the transition to a low-carbon future.

In this chapter, we draw on our study involving interviews with Australians who identify as current self-trackers to discuss why and how they monitor themselves. Our approach for analysing self-tracking practices is based on a sociomaterial perspective, viewing enactments of voluntary self-tracking as shifting heterogeneous assemblages, bringing together diverse actors who are both human and non-human. We use vignettes to illustrate the ways in which our participants enacted self-tracking and to identify some of the diverse meanings and motivations that mediate decisions to self-track and resultant uses of the information thus generated. We found that a varied range of self-tracking practices were taken up by our interviewees, including not only digital devices and methods, but also recording their details using pen-and-paper, or simply maintaining mental awareness and using memory. We identified several agential capacities in our participants’ accounts of why and how they monitor themselves. These capacities are interrelated, but can be loosely grouped under the headings of ‘self-improvement’, ‘exerting control’ and ‘identifying patterns and achieving goals’. They are motivators and facilitators of monitoring practices. The broader sociocultural contexts in which monitoring of the body/self is undertaken were also revealed in the participants’ accounts. These include ideas about the moral virtues of self-responsibility and the individual management of life circumstances to avoid chaos and risk, and the notion that monitoring practices can successfully achieve these virtues.

Purpose – To investigate the potential future role of information delivery in terms of reducing transport-related emissions. The assumed response of travellers to information and the notions of content and context are provided, together with factors that can determine an individual's propensity to seek and engage with travel information.

Methodology/approach – A review of information use, the behavioural stages of change and context design is undertaken, incorporating a research case study in the use of framing.

Findings – Recent theoretical and empirical insights into behavioural change provide new insights into the role of information in reducing transport-related emissions. Traveller information offers many benefits to the user and could be influential in affecting travel behaviour change, although there are socio-psychological factors outside the control of information service designers that also need to be considered, such as the ‘stage of change’ people are at in relation to a change in behaviour.

Originality/value – The chapter examines how travel information could go beyond the provision of trip choice data and incorporate contextual elements to make it more effective. Concepts related to the Transtheoretical Model (stages of change) and the latest thinking in behavioural economics are discussed in relation to an increase in the likelihood of environmental travel alternatives being considered and chosen.

This chapter presents results of a research project in which we give direction to the further design of the technical research that will lay the foundation for an automated digital feedback module. This module will help residents in saving energy and making home improvements in the context of the heat/energy transition. Interviews with residents and field experts were used to gain data about motivations and barriers residents experience when making home adjustments in the heat transition. Results reveal the experiences residents have in this transition. Based on the results, recommendations are made for the further development of an automated digital feedback module.

Introduction: Digitalization has become crucial in our daily lives. The rapid rise of new technologies and high interest levels of individuals enforces companies to invest in these technologies. Nowadays, as customers are willing to try new experiences, companies dynamically start to find new ways to develop their products and services. One of the most popular technologies used by companies to improve their services is the Internet of Things (IoT) technologies. Education, health, transportation, retail, and energy are some of the industries in which the IoT is frequently being used. As security concerns of individuals arose and willingness to remote control increases, innovative and technological projects with IoT applications are engaged in the construction and real estate sector.

Aim: The purpose of this chapter is to explore IoT applications within the new generation smart home systems. In this framework, the effect of IoT technologies on architectural structure of the smart home and operating systems as well as IoT and mobile-supported customer-focused applications and difficulties are analyzed.

Method: The study is designed as an exploratory study. The data are obtained from face-to-face interviews with companies operating on technology-based commercial and residential projects. Descriptive analysis method is used to analyze data. Sample selection was carried out by the judicial sampling technique.

Findings: The results showed that smart home systems offer several customer-oriented experiences to their users like personalized accessibility, comfort, time control, and energy savings. Wired and wireless communication protocols are included in the architecture of the system. Linux core software-based Android and iOS operating systems are used in order to enhance personal accessibility. However, some difficulties are noticed in the sector. Lack of information and internet infrastructure of companies that install electrical set-up are mentioned. Contractors, after sales service support, and customer-oriented applications are evaluated.

In France, as in other countries, the idea of installing rooftop photovoltaic (PV) panels in private homes is based on an incentive scheme (tax advantages, feed-in tariffs, etc.) inspired by neoclassical economic theory. In the case of electricity producers in Reunion Island, unlike economists, we argue that producers’ calculations involve decision-making criteria which go further than any simple evaluation of economic costs and benefits.

Our approach is based on concepts of economic anthropology and on observations and semi-structured interviews conducted in the homes of the producers.

This ethnographic method allowed us to examine economic rationalities which revealed the anticipation of an energy landscape that will be subject to issues relating to the environment, access to electricity, evolution in the local electricity market, and household budget management. In this context, producers’ representations of solar power and of processes for commoditizing and decommoditizing the electricity produced (sold on the network/“free” when consumed) make compatible preservation of the environment and social norms of consumption.

This paper focuses on PV energy producers (who have been the object of very little research) and thus provides input for existing reflection on the diversity of economic rationalities. Such insight is important for understanding how people respond to policy appeals for PV panels. Anthropology therefore has an important role to play in the debate on energy transition. This conclusion paves the way for similar research in other contexts (of a non-insular nature in particular) which would allow for a promising comparative anthropological approach.

Climate change has been identified as a pressing social, environmental and economical challenge that has been unequivocally linked to human activity through latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports. It is here to stay with us for generations to come and is already causing severe tribulations across the world. As nations devise policies to mitigate to climate change to stay within the 1.5 degrees Celsius target and small island developing states (SIDS) like Mauritius and the developing world in general find means to adapt to its consequences, a core shortcoming highlighted is the lack of community engagement and grassroots action so that policies permeate to concrete action. Of prime importance for this to happen is raising awareness on the climate change phenomenon, which has so far been a topic deemed complex for the general public, hence creating systemic barriers for climate action. The use of artificial intelligence (AI) can play a significant role in designing such community outreach programmes based on outcomes reported in literature in the educational sector in support of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4: Quality Education. There is growing interest for a green lifestyle in the world population, and this chapter shows how the home can be used as a basic building block for allowing each household to contribute to climate action, while offering an effective case study to raise awareness on climate change through practical examples and demonstration, in support for SDG 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities. Based on an energy-water-materials nexus, the circular home concept is a clear contribution to SDG 13: Climate Action, with huge potential to use AI techniques and underpinning technologies to implement and optimise the efficacy of the proposed measures.