Getting the message across evaluating energy efficiency information campaigns in New Zealand : presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Philosophy (Resource and Environmental Planning) at Massey University

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Date
1995
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Massey University
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Abstract
The New Zealand government, state owned enterprises and private organisations have been active, in the past and currently, in promoting energy efficiency and energy conservation through information provision campaigns. However, with a few exceptions, there has been a failure to evaluate the effectiveness of the programmes, and therefore assess whether the programmes have worked. Given the resources that are committed to the development and implementation of these information campaigns, it is important to assess how effective they are. Evaluation of these campaigns can help determine the most appropriate approaches that should be taken in the future, and helps to improve existing campaigns. Evaluation also has an important role to play in terms of accountability within the organisations that operate these information campaigns. A general evaluation process was designed in this research for the evaluation of two selected energy efficiency information campaigns. The evaluation process was designed after thorough reviews of past evaluations of similar campaigns, both in New Zealand and internationally, and from an extensive review of the theoretical and applied literature on programme evaluation. Home energy audit programmes were selected as the energy efficiency information campaigns to be evaluated, with the Energy Efficiency Assessment Plan operated by Southpower, and the Home Energy Rating Options programme being operated by CentralPower being chosen as the two case studies. The results indicate that the programmes evaluated do indeed work; however, analysis suggests that these programmes may be less effective than their potential. From the selected case studies a number of recommendations were developed to improve the effectiveness of the programmes, with a review of the methodology highlighting the limitations of the study. Finally, consideration was given to the role that programme evaluation has in the development, implementation and operation of energy efficiency information campaigns in the future, and its usefulness in assessing the effectiveness of energy efficiency information campaigns in New Zealand.
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Energy conservation, Energy consumption, State owned enterprises, New Zealand, Energy efficiency campaigns
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