Modelling lifestyle effects on energy demand and related emissions

An approach to analyse and quantify the impact of lifestyle factors on current and future energy demand is developed. Thereby not only directly environmentally relevant consumer activities such as car use or heating have been analysed, but also expenditure patterns which induce environmental damage through the production of the consumed goods. The use of household survey data from the national statistical offices offers the possibility to cover this wide range of activities. For the available social–economic household characteristics a variety of different behavioural patterns have been observed. For evaluating the energy and emission consequences of the consumed goods enhanced input–output models are used. The additions implemented — a mixed monetary-energetic approach for inter-industry flows and a separate treatment of transport-related emissions — improve the reliability of the obtained results. The developed approach has been used for analysing current emission profiles and distributions in West Germany, France and the Netherlands as well as scenarios for future energy demand and related emissions. It therefore provides a comprehensive methodology to analyse environmental effects in a consumer and citizen perspective and thus contributes to an increased transparency of complex economic and ecological interconnections.