A micro-panel data analysis of residential energy demand in Germany

Abstract

Stylized representations of actually diverse populations of private households are ubiquitous in research and policy. This is at odds with evidence that the transition towards a low-carbon energy system hinges on questions of social inequality, distributional impacts, fairness and justice. We apply machine learning on micro-panel data to present a detailed empirical analysis of heterogeneity in Germany's residential energy consumption. The results enable good governance by helping to predicting the distributional impacts of public policies or other events.