Influencing domestic customers´ market behavior with time flexible tariffs

In a field test in a typical rural town in Germany, which represents the housing situation of nearly 50% of Germany´s population, Smart Meters were installed in private households to find out how domestic customers react to new technology as well as to new tariff models. A time-flexible tariff has been introduced successfully and showed significant behavior changes in times of high tariff as well as in times of low tariff. The work at hand explains market basics on energy consumption of private customers and reveals their behavior when billed according to a time flexible tariff. The findings are derived from real load profiles. This publication profits due to its interdisciplinary character both from social and power engineering knowledge.