Pre- and post-COVID-19 household energy data analysis to support utility and property management policy

随着COVID-19大流行的到来，我们尚未全面了解其影响。由于病毒引发的限制措施，政策制定者推出了从关闭到在家工作的命令，能源供应部门受到了很大影响。家庭能源消费增加，原因是传统需求（空间取暖、热水、烹饪和洗碗等）和新需求（与远程办公相关）。随着即将到来的计划重新开放，远程办公将继续，但办公室生活-以某种形式-也将。这将在一定程度上使非居民能源需求随着家庭需求的增加而沿着恢复到正常水平，这将对能源供应能力造成更大的压力。在这方面，电网运营商、住房供应商及其客户面临着无数挑战，从供应链到经济影响、需求预测的不确定性以及最终客户支付账单的能力等更广泛的问题。 该项目的目标是从两个不同的角度独特地探索这些研究问题：供应方（水电渥太华）和需求方（渥太华社区住房）。拟议的研究代表了加拿大能源部门的独特贡献，并将解决现有的几个挑战。该伙伴关系的计划成果为：（i）编制COVID-19导致的代表性家庭能源需求每日概况;（ii）深入了解因COVID-19政策而被迫在家工作的知识型员工的能源相关态度、行为和信念;及（iii）就电价政策制定循证指引╱建议，能源效率措施的方法，如果远程工作普及，长期适应。就能源供应的经济性和可用性而言，该项目对公用事业和建筑物管理人员以及对单个家庭同样重要。此外，由于与能源有关的行为和习惯可能产生长期影响，这对环境也有影响。

With the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic, we do not have a complete picture yet of what the impacts are. The energy supply sector has been greatly affected as a result of the virus-induced restrictions that have been rolled out by policymakers from closures to work-from-home orders. Households energy consumption has increased due to both conventional demand (space heating, hot water, cooking and dish washing, etc.) and new demand (related to teleworking). With the upcoming planned re-opening, teleworking will continue, but office life - in some form - will too. This will return the non-residential energy demand, to some extent, to its regular level along with the increased household demand, which will put more pressure on the energy supply capacity. In this regard, there are myriad challenges that grid operators, housing providers, and their customers face, from the supply chain to broader questions about the economic impact, uncertainty in demand projections, and the ability of end customers to pay their bills. The goal of the project aims to uniquely explore these research problems from two different angles: supply-side (Hydro Ottawa) and demand-side (Ottawa Community Housing). The proposed research represents a unique contribution to the energy sector across Canada and will address several existing challenges. The planned outcomes of this partnership are (i) development of a representative households' energy demand daily profile resulting from COVID-19, (ii) gain insights about the energy-related attitudes, behaviours, and beliefs of knowledge-based workers who are now forced to work from home as a result of COVID-19 policies, and (iii) develop evidence-based guidance/recommendations in terms of electricity pricing policy, approaches to energy efficiency measures, long-term adaptation if telework becomes popular. This project is equally important for utilities and building managers as it is for individual households, regarding the economics and availability of energy supply. Moreover, it has environmental implications because of the potential long-term impacts of energy-related behaviour and habits.