PEAKapp · Project

Mobile App That Cuts Household Electricity Bills Through Smart Tariffs and Behavioral Nudges

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Imagine an app on your phone that watches your electricity use in real time and tells you when power is cheapest — like a gas price tracker, but for your home. It nudges you to run the dishwasher or charge your car when wind and solar are flooding the grid, making electricity dirt cheap. The app turns saving energy into a game with challenges and social features, so people actually stick with it. It was tested in real social housing buildings across four European countries and only needs a smart meter to work — no extra gadgets.

By the numbers

230 million

EU dwellings addressable without extra hardware

electricity utilities ready to sign implementation

countries with real-life validation (AT, EE, SE, LV)

consortium partners across 7 countries

EUR 1,938,085

EU investment in development and validation

total project deliverables produced

The business problem

What needed solving

European electricity utilities need to shift household demand away from expensive peak hours, but consumers have no visibility into real-time pricing and no motivation to change behavior. Meanwhile, the EU smart meter rollout is creating infrastructure that goes largely underused because there is no consumer-facing layer to translate meter data into actionable savings.

The solution

What was built

A smartphone and tablet app connected to a backend processing unit that delivers dynamic electricity pricing to households, with gamification and social features to sustain engagement. The system was validated in real social housing across 4 European countries and designed to work with only smart meters as hardware.

Audience

Who needs this

Electricity retailers looking for competitive dynamic tariff productsSocial housing associations trying to reduce tenant energy costsSmart home platform companies wanting to add energy pricing featuresEnergy regulators studying demand-response behavior at household scaleMunicipal utilities planning smart meter integration services

Business applications

Who can put this to work

Electric utilities

enterprise

Target: Electricity retailers and distribution companies

If you are an electricity utility looking to reduce peak demand and offer competitive tariff products — this project developed a ready-to-deploy app ecosystem that connects to smart meters and delivers dynamic pricing to household customers. The system was validated in real social housing across 4 countries and more than 3 utilities were ready to sign implementation agreements by project end. It only requires smart meters as in-house hardware, making rollout fast.

Social housing management

mid-size

Target: Public housing associations and property managers

If you are a social housing provider struggling with tenant energy costs and building efficiency targets — this project built and tested an app specifically in publicly owned social housing in Austria, Estonia, Sweden and Latvia. It engages tenants through gamification and social features to change energy behavior without requiring any extra hardware beyond existing smart meters. The consortium of 13 partners across 7 countries validated the approach under real-life conditions.

Smart home and energy tech

SME

Target: Smart home platform providers and energy management startups

If you are a smart home company looking to integrate energy management into your platform — this project created an ICT ecosystem that bridges smart home building energy management with dynamic spot-market pricing for households. The app was designed to integrate with existing smart home systems while requiring only smart meters as additional hardware. With 230 million dwellings across the EU as the addressable market, the low hardware barrier enables fast market uptake.

Frequently asked

Quick answers

What does it cost to implement this system?

The EU invested EUR 1,938,085 in developing and validating the full ICT ecosystem. The system was designed to require only smart meters as in-house hardware, which keeps deployment costs low since many EU households already have or will soon receive smart meters under EU rollout targets.

Can this scale to millions of households?

The system was explicitly designed for mass-market scale. The objective states it targets 230 million dwellings across the EU and requires no extra efficiency hardware beyond smart meters. This low hardware barrier was a core design principle to enable fast market uptake.

What about intellectual property and licensing?

The project was a Research and Innovation Action (RIA) funded under Horizon 2020 with 13 consortium partners. IP arrangements would need to be negotiated with the coordinator (Energieinstitut at Johannes Kepler University Linz). Based on available project data, more than 3 electricity utilities were already ready to sign implementation agreements.

Has this been tested in real buildings with real people?

Yes. Validation under real-life conditions was carried out in publicly owned social housing in Austria, Estonia, Sweden and Latvia. The smartphone and tablet app was built, coupled to the backbone processing unit, and pre-tested with actual residents.

Does this work with existing smart home systems?

Yes. The PEAKapp ecosystem was designed to integrate with existing smart home building energy management systems. It boosts their efficacy by adding dynamic pricing, behavioral nudges, and gamification features on top of what is already installed.

What regulatory support exists for this approach?

The project included energy market analyses that derived implications for regulatory practice to better support energy efficiency goals. The EU smart meter rollout targets create a favorable regulatory environment since the system only needs smart meters to function.

Who else is backing this outside Europe?

EPRI (Electric Power Research Institute), the leading US energy research organization, took responsibility for fostering international market uptake as part of the exploitation activities — without receiving project funding, which signals genuine commercial interest.

Consortium

Who built it

The PEAKapp consortium is strong on industry involvement: 8 out of 13 partners are industrial (62%), with 4 SMEs bringing agility and 2 research organizations providing scientific backing. The 7-country spread (AT, DE, DK, EE, ES, NL, TR) gives broad European market coverage, and real-world pilots ran in 4 countries. The coordinator is an energy research institute at Johannes Kepler University in Austria. Notably, EPRI — the leading US energy research body — contributed to exploitation without EU funding, signaling external commercial confidence. With 22 deliverables produced and a working app demo, the consortium delivered a tangible product rather than just papers.

ENERGIEINSTITUT AN DER JOHANNES KEPLER UNIVERSITAT LINZ VEREINCoordinator · AT
ELEKTRIK DAGITIM HIZMETLERI DERNEGI(ELDER)participant · TR
FUNDACION TECNALIA RESEARCH & INNOVATIONparticipant · ES
DANMARKS TEKNISKE UNIVERSITETparticipant · DK
RTDS - VEREIN ZUR FORDERUNG DER KOMMUNIKATION UND VERMITTLUNG VON FORSCHUNG, TECHNOLOGIE UND INNOVATION (RTDS VEREIN, ENGL. RTDS ASSOCIATION)participant · AT
GREENPOCKET GMBHparticipant · DE

How to reach the team

Energieinstitut at Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria — contact through SciTransfer for a warm introduction

Order a report on this consortium See ENERGIEINSTITUT AN DER JOHANNES KEPLER UNIVERSITAT LINZ VEREIN profile →

Next steps

Talk to the team behind this work.

Want to license PEAKapp technology or explore a pilot with your utility? SciTransfer can arrange a direct introduction to the development team and help structure a commercial partnership.

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