Abstract
Climate change has provoked several grand societal challenges that require transdisciplinary approaches to interconnected problems. The need to re-shape our energy systems away from fossil fuels through smart energy technologies for managing end use consumption represents one such challenge. The EU funds large, interdisciplinary projects calling for broad stakeholder involvement, including end users whose involvement is crucial for making sure new and carbon-reducing digital solutions will work in practice. The EU Horizon 2020 SENDER-project used the methodological approach of co-creation to bring various energy technology stakeholders together. Empirical results and experiences from the project’s research design and workshops – bringing together diverse stakeholder inputs – demonstrate the extent to which co-creation allows for adjustments in initial solution design based on actual user input. This is important for creating solutions that are effective in enabling households to engage in demand response. Co-creation within the context of large Horizon projects like SENDER offers a robust way to engender transdisciplinary modes of working. However, though it does enable a degree of user-involvement, the extent to which co-creation is observed in this project was limited, primarily to user contributions regarding technology design as delineated in established use cases. Thus co-creation falls short in this case for providing an example of user- or citizen-driven innovation.