Reframing heat pump transitions: a care perspective
References
- Aggeli, A., Christensen, T. H., & Larsen, S. P. A. K. (2022). The gendering of energy household labour. Buildings & Cities, 3(1), 709–724. 10.5334/bc.224
- Arora, S. (2019). Admitting uncertainty, transforming engagement: Towards caring practices for sustainability beyond climate change. Regional Environmental Change, 19(6), 1571–1584.
- Arora, S., Van Dyck, B., Sharma, D., & Stirling, A. (2020). Control, care, and conviviality in the politics of technology for sustainability. Sustainability: Science, Practice and Policy, 16(1), 247–262.
- Bartiaux, F. (2022). Gender roles and domestic power in energy-saving home improvements. Buildings & Cities, 3(1), 824–841. 10.5334/bc.232
- Boell, S. K., & Cecez-Kecmanovic, D. (2014). A hermeneutic approach for conducting literature reviews and literature searches. Communications of the Association for Information Systems, 34, 257–286. 10.17705/1CAIS.03412
- Botha, L., Druta, O., & van Wesemael, P. (2025). Prefiguring the caring city: Everyday practices and postcapitalist possibility in neighborhood living rooms. Urban Planning, 10.
- Caird, S., Roy, R., & Potter, S. (2012). Domestic heat pumps in the UK: User behaviour, satisfaction and performance. Energy Efficiency, 5(3), 283–301.
- Callon, M. (2008).
Economic markets and the rise of interactive agencements: From prosthetic agencies to habilitated agencies . In T. Pinch & R. Swedberg (Eds.), Living in a material world: Economic sociology meets science and technology studies (pp. 29–56). MIT Press. 10.7551/mitpress/7838.003.0003 - Calver, P., Mander, S., & Abi Ghanem, D. (2022). Low carbon system innovation through an energy justice lens: Exploring domestic heat pump adoption with direct load control in the United Kingdom. Energy Research & Social Science, 83,
102299 . 10.1016/j.erss.2021.102299 - Cherry, C., Hopfe, C., MacGillivray, B., & Pidgeon, N. (2017). Homes as machines: Exploring expert and public imaginaries of low carbon housing futures in the United Kingdom. Energy Research & Social Science, 23, 36–45.
- Costanza-Chock, S. (2018). Design justice: Towards an intersectional feminist framework for design theory and practice. MIT Press. 10.7551/mitpress/12255.001.0001
- Crawley, J., Wade, F., & de Wilde, M. (2023). Gender and the heat pump transition. Buildings & Cities, 4(1), 948–964. 10.5334/bc.392
- Damgaard, C. S., McCauley, D., & Reid, L. (2022). Towards energy care ethics: Exploring ethical implications of relationality within energy systems in transition. Energy Research & Social Science, 84,
102356 . 10.1016/j.erss.2021.102356 - Day, R., & Hitchings, R. (2011). ‘Only old ladies would do that’: Age stigma and older people’s strategies for dealing with winter cold. Health & Place, 17(4), 885–894. 10.1016/j.healthplace.2011.04.011
- De la Bellacasa, M. P. (2017). Matters of care: Speculative ethics in more than human worlds. University of Minnesota Press.
- De Wilde, M. (2020a). A care-infused market tale: on (not) maintaining relationships of trust in energy retrofit products. Journal of Cultural Economy, 13(5), 561–578. 10.1080/17530350.2020.1741016
- De Wilde, M. (2020b). ‘A heat pump needs a bit of care’: On maintainability and repairing gender–technology relations. Science, Technology, & Human Values, 46(6), 1261–1285. 10.1177/0162243920978301
- Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy. (2021). Heat and buildings strategy. HM Government.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/heat-and-buildings-strategy - Devine-Wright, P., Wrapson, W., Henshaw, V., & Guy, S. (2014). Low carbon heating and older adults: Comfort, cosiness and glow. Building Research & Information, 42(3), 288–299.
- Dirkx, M. (2025, October 24). Dutch elections underscore risk to EU climate ambition amid political instability. Clean Energy Wire.
https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/dutch-elections-underscore-risk-eu-climate-ambition-amid-political-instability - Ellsworth-Krebs, K., Reid, L. A. & Hunter, C. J. (2015). Home-ing in on domestic energy research : ‘house’, ‘home’ and the importance of ontology. Energy Research and Social Science, 6, 100–108. 10.1016/j.erss.2014.12.003
- European Commission (2019). The European Green Deal (COM(2019) 640 final).
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:52019DC0640 - Foucault, M. (2007). Security, territory, population: Lectures at the Collège de France, 1977–1978 (G. Burchell, Trans.). New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.
- Fraser, N. (2016). Contradictions of capital and care. New Left Review, 100, 99–117.
- Fraser, N. (2022). Cannibal capitalism: How our system is devouring democracy, care, and the planet and what we can do about it. Verso.
- Gabauer, A., Knierbein, S., Cohen, N., Lebuhn, H., Trogal, K., & Viderman, T. (2021).
Care, uncare, and the city . In A. Gabauer, S. Knierbein, N. Cohen, H. Lebuhn, K. Trogal, T. Viderman & T. Haas (Eds.), Care and the City (pp. 3–14). Routledge. 10.4324/9781003031536 - Gilligan, C. (1982). In a different voice: Psychological theory and women’s development. Harvard University Press.
- Godin, L., & Langlois, J. (2021). Care, gender, and change in the study of sustainable consumption: A critical review of the literature. Frontiers in Sustainability, 2. 10.3389/frsus.2021.725753
- Graeber, D. (2019). From managerial feudalism to the revolt of the caring classes.
https://opentranscripts.org/transcript/managerial-feudalism-revolt-caring-classes/ - Gram-Hanssen, K. (2024). Beyond energy justice: Ethics of care as a new approach in the energy system. Energy Research & Social Science, 111,
103470 . 10.1016/j.erss.2024.103470 - Gram-Hanssen, K., Christensen, T. H., & Petersen, P. E. (2012). Air-to-air heat pumps in real-life use: Are potential savings achieved or are they transformed into increased comfort? Energy and Buildings, 53, 64–73. 10.1016/j.enbuild.2012.06.023
- Gray, E. K., & McArdle, R. (2025). Communities and the European Green Deal: Opening ‘sites of struggle’ for a democratic energy transition. Journal of European Integration, 47(2), 193–215. 10.1080/07036337.2025.2455683
- Greene, M. (2018). Socio-technical transitions and dynamics in everyday consumption practice. Global Environmental Change, 52, 1–9.
- Haas, T., Sander, H., Fuenfgeld, A., & Mey, F. (2025). Climate obstruction at work: Right-wing populism and the German heating law. Energy Research & Social Science, 123,
104034 . - Halvorsen, B., Larsen, B. M., Wilhite, H., & Winther, T. (2016). Revisiting household energy rebound: Perspectives from a multidisciplinary study. Indoor and Built Environment, 25(7), 1114–1123.
- Harvey, F., & Cooke, P. (2023, July 20). Gas boiler lobby trying to delay UK’s heat pump plans, leak shows. The Guardian.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jul/20/gas-boiler-lobby-uk-heat-pump-plans-leak - Healy, S. (2008). Air-conditioning and the ‘homogenization’ of people and built environments. Building Research & Information, 36(4), 312–322. 10.1080/09613210802076351
- Held, V. (1993). Feminist morality: Transforming culture, society, and politics. University of Chicago Press.
- Held, V. (2005). The Ethics of Care. Oxford University Press. 10.1093/0195180992.001.0001
- Herreras Martínez, S., Mesman, J., Sneum, D. M., Holstenkamp, L., Harmsen, R., Menkveld, M., Akerboom, S., & Faaij, A. (2025). From consumers to pioneers: insights from thermal energy communities in Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands. Energy, Sustainability and Society, 15(1). 10.1186/s13705-024-00499-4
- Heyen, A. D., Hermwille, L., & Wehnert, T. (2017). Out of the comfort zone! Governing the exnovation of unsustainable technologies and practices. GAIA-Ecological Perspectives for Science and Society, 26(4), 326–331.
- Hill, D. P., & Mazzucato, M. (2024). Modern housing: An environmental common good. Council on Urban Initiatives.
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/publications/2024/mar/modern-housing-environmental-common-good - Huber, R. A., Maltby, T., Szulecki, K., & Ćetković, S. (2021). Is populism a challenge to European energy and climate policy? Empirical evidence across varieties of populism. Journal of European Public Policy, 28(7), 998–1017.
- Hyysalo, S., Juntunen, J. K., & Freeman, S. (2013). Internet forums and the rise of the inventive energy user. Science & Technology Studies, 26(1), 25–51. 10.23987/sts
- IEA (2022). The future of heat pumps. International Energy Agency (IEA).
https://iea.blob.core.windows.net/assets/4713780d-c0ae-4686-8c9b-29e782452695/TheFutureofHeatPumps.pdf - Jackson, T. (2025). The care economy. John Wiley & Sons.
- Jensen, R. H., Kjeldskov, J., & Skov, M. B. (2016, October). HeatDial: Beyond user scheduling in eco-interaction. In Proceedings of the 9th Nordic conference on human-computer interaction, Article 74, 1–10. 10.1145/2971485.2971525
- Judson, E., Bell, S., Bulkeley, H., Powells, G., & Lyon, S. (2015). The co-construction of energy provision and everyday practice: Integrating heat pumps in social housing in England. Science and Technology Studies, 28(3), 26–53.
- Johnson, C. (2020). Is demand side response a woman’s work? Domestic labour and electricity shifting in low income homes in the United Kingdom. Energy Research & Social Science, 68,
101558 . 10.1016/j.erss.2020.101558 - Kaandorp, C., Pessoa, I. T. M., Pesch, U., van de Giesen, N., & Abraham, E. (2024). ‘Commoning practices’ for energy justice? Perspectives on the heat transition in the city of Amsterdam. Energy Research & Social Science, 108,
103369 . 10.1016/j.erss.2023.103369 - Karakislak, I. (2025). Understanding energy struggles through systems of power: A systematic review of intersectionality in energy social science and humanities. Energy Research & Social Science, 127,
104324 . 10.1016/j.erss.2025.104324 - Klinenberg, E. (2018). Palaces for the people: How to build a more equal and united society. Random House.
- Latour, B., & Schultz, N. (2022). On the emergence of an ecological class: A memo. John Wiley & Sons.
- Leggett, W. (2014). The politics of behaviour change: Nudge, neoliberalism and the state. Policy & Politics, 42(1), 3–19.
- Liodaki, D., & Apostolopoulou, E. (2026). Community energy as care infrastructure: Insights from two energy communities in England and Greece. Energy Research & Social Science, 136,
104704 . 10.1016/j.erss.2026.104704 - Lopes, A. M., Healy, S., Power, E., Crabtree, L., & Gibson, K. (2018). Infrastructures of care: Opening up ‘home’ as commons in a hot city. Human Ecology Review, 24(2), 41–59.
- Lucas-Healey, K., Ransan-Cooper, H., Temby, H., & Russell, A. W. (2022). Who cares? How care practices uphold the decentralised energy order. Buildings & Cities, 3(1), 448–463. 10.5334/bc.219
- Madsen, L. V. (2017). The comfortable home and energy consumption. Housing, Theory and Society, 35(3), 329–352. 10.1080/14036096.2017.1348390
- Madsen, L. V. (2025). Caring for comfort? How social relations shape household practices of home comfort as care. Housing, Theory and Society, 42(5), 521–523. 10.1080/14036096.2025.2478840
- Maldonado-Mariscal, K., & Hölsgens, R. (2024). Reimagining innovation pathways: Exnovation and Buen Vivir as global north–south dialogues. Journal of Responsible Innovation, 11(1),
2414510 . - Mathiesen, K. (2023, October 4). How the far right turned heat pumps into electoral rocket fuel. Politico Europe.
https://www.politico.eu/article/robert-lambrou-alternative-for-germany-heat-pump-election-climate-change/ - Martin, A., Myers, N., & Viseu, A. (2015). The politics of care in technoscience. Social Studies of Science, 45(5), 625–641.
- Martiskainen, M., & Sovacool, B. K. (2021). Mixed feelings: A review and research agenda for emotions in sustainability transitions. Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions, 40, 609–624. 10.1016/j.eist.2021.10.023
- Meissner, M. (2021). Repair is care? Dimensions of care within collaborative practices in repair cafes. Journal of Cleaner Production, 299,
126913 . 10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.126913 - Mesman, J. (2011).
Resources of strength: An exnovation of hidden competences to preserve patient safety . In E. Rowley & J. Waring (Eds.), A socio-cultural perspective on patient safety (pp. 71–92). Ashgate. - Mol, A., Moser, I., & Pols, A. J. (2010). Care in practice. On tinkering in clinics, homes and farms. Transcript.
- Moroşanu, R. (2016). An ethnography of household energy demand in the UK. Palgrave Macmillan US. 10.1057/978-1-137-59341-2
- Moser, I. (2000). Against normalisation: Subverting norms of ability and disability. Science as Culture, 9(2), 201–240.
- Netherlands Court of Audit (2025, February 4). Government heat network policy at odds with domestic heat pump grants.
https://english.rekenkamer.nl/latest/news/2025/02/04/government-heat-network-policy-at-odds-with-domestic-heat-pump-grants - Noddings, N. (1984). Caring: A feminine approach to ethics and moral education. University of California Press.
- Owen, A., Mitchell, G., & Unsworth, R. (2013). Reducing carbon, tackling fuel poverty: Adoption and performance of air-source heat pumps in East Yorkshire, UK. Local Environment, 18(7), 817–833. 10.1080/13549839.2012.732050
- Paterson, M., Wilshire, S., & Tobin, P. (2024). The rise of anti-net zero populism in the UK: Comparing rhetorical strategies for climate policy dismantling. Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and Practice, 26(3–4), 332–350.
- Petrova, S., & Simcock, N. (2019). Gender and energy: domestic inequities reconsidered. Social & Cultural Geography, 22(6), 849–867. 10.1080/14649365.2019.1645200
- Pink, S., Dahlgren, K., Strengers, Y., & Nicholls, L. (2022a).
Anticipatory infrastructures, emerging technologies and visions of energy futures . In J. Valkonen, V. Kinnunen, H. Huilaja & T. Loikkanen (Eds.), Infrastructural being: Rethinking dwelling in a naturecultural world, 33–60. - Pink, S., Strengers, Y., Martin, R., & Dahlgren, K. (2022b). Smart home masculinities. Australian Feminist Studies, 37(112), 117–133.
- Posselt, G. (2021). Self-care and truth-telling: Rethinking care with Foucault. Le foucaldien, 7(1).
- Psarra, I., Turhan, E., & Ghassemialiabadi, F. (2024). Zero carbon, some nuisance: Exploring the viewpoints of heat pump owners and their neighbors in Groningen, Netherlands. Energy Sources, Part B: Economics, Planning, and Policy, 19(1). 10.1080/15567249.2024.2421924
- Quinn, B. (2025, January 1). UK government hires ‘nudge unit’ to help dispel heat pump myths. The Guardian.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jan/01/uk-government-dispel-heat-pump-myths-misinformation-media - Raap, S., Knibbe, M., & Horstman, K. (2022). Caring neighbourhoods: Maintaining collective care under neoliberal care reforms. European Journal of Social Work, 25(5), 867–879. 10.1080/13691457.2021.1997928
- Robinson, F. (1997). Globalizing care: Ethics, feminist theory, and international relations. Alternatives, 22(1), 113–133.
- Sadowski, J., Strengers, Y., & Kennedy, J. (2024). More work for Big Mother: Revaluing care and control in smart homes. Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space, 56(1), 330–345.
- Schuilenburg, M., & Peeters, R. (2018). Smart cities and the architecture of security: Pastoral power and the scripted design of public space. City, Territory and Architecture, 5(1). 10.1186/s40410-018-0090-8
- Scoones, I. (2024). Navigating uncertainty: Radical rethinking for a turbulent world. Polity Press.
- Shirani, F., O’Sullivan, K., Henwood, K., Hale, R., & Pidgeon, N. (2022). Living in an active home: Household dynamics and unintended consequences. Buildings & Cities, 3(1), 589–604. 10.5334/bc.216
- Shove, E. (2010). Beyond the ABC: climate change policy and theories of social change. Environment and Planning A, 42(6), 1273–1285.
- Shove, E. (2017). What is wrong with energy efficiency? Building Research & Information, 46(7): 779–789.
- Sintov, N. D., White, L. V., & Walpole, H. (2019). Thermostat wars? The roles of gender and thermal comfort negotiations in household energy use behavior. PLOS ONE, 14(11),
e0224198 . 10.1371/journal.pone.0224198 - Sovacool, B. K., Demski, C., & Noel, L. (2021). Beyond climate, culture and comfort in European preferences for low-carbon heat. Global Environmental Change, 66,
102200 . 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2020.102200 - Sovacool, B. K., Lipson, M. M., & Chard, R. (2019). Temporality, vulnerability, and energy justice in household low carbon innovations. Energy Policy, 128, 495–504. 10.1016/j.enpol.2019.01.010
- Sovacool, B. K., & Martiskainen, M. (2020). Hot transformations: Governing rapid and deep household heating transitions in China, Denmark, Finland and the United Kingdom. Energy Policy, 139,
111330 . - Strengers, Y. (2013). Smart energy technologies in everyday life: Smart utopia? Palgrave Macmillan.
- Strengers, Y. (2023). Resource Man and the Smart Wife: Implications for sustainability in the home. Interactions, 30(2), 36–40.
- Strengers, Y., Nicholls, L., & Maller, C. (2016). Curious energy consumers: Humans and nonhumans in assemblages of household practice. Journal of Consumer Culture, 16(3), 761–780.
- Sullivan-Thomsett, C., Jordan, A., Lorenzoni, I., & Geese, L. (2024). How not to transform: Learning from the backlash against low-carbon heating policy in Germany (CAST Briefing 28). Centre for Climate Change and Social Transformations.
https://cast.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/CAST-the-centre-for-climate-change-and-social-transformations-cast-briefing-28-how-not-to-transform-learning-from-the-backlash-against-low-carbon-heating-policy-in-germany.pdf - Tronto, J. C. (1993). Moral boundaries: A political argument for an ethic of care. Psychology Press.
- Tronto, J. C. (2013). Caring democracy: Markets, equality, and justice. New York University Press.
- van Balen, S., & van Oorschot, I. (2025). Composing climate change as a matter of everyday living: Thinking against displacement. Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space, 23996544251321619.
- van Beek, E., Boess, S., Bozzon, A., & Giaccardi, E. (2024). Practice reconfigurations around heat pumps in and beyond Dutch households. Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions, 53,
100903 . 10.1016/j.eist.2024.100903 - van der Schoor, T., & van der Windt, H. J. (2023). Negotiating Dutch citizen-led district heating projects: Managing internal, external, and material networks to achieve successful implementation. Energy Research & Social Science, 102,
103166 . 10.1016/j.erss.2023.103166 - van Oorschot, I., & van Balen, S. (2025). Sensing and making sense of climate change in a Western European urban setting: Bodily exposures, uncertain epistemologies, and climatic care practices. The Sociological Review, 73(5), 1085–1103.
- van Veelen, B., & van der Horst, D. (2018). What is energy democracy? Connecting social science energy research and political theory. Energy Research & Social Science, 46, 19–28. 10.1016/j.erss.2018.06.010
- Velotti, L., & Cigna, L. M. (2024). The caring classes: A socio-demographic and occupational analysis of caring values. The Sociological Review, 72(6), 1211–1239.
- Voeten, E. (2024). The energy transition and support for the radical right: Evidence from the Netherlands. Comparative Political Studies, 58(2), 394–428.
- von der Burchard, H. (2023, September 7). How heat pumps exploded Germany’s ruling coalition. Politico Europe.
https://www.politico.eu/article/heat-pumps-exploded-germany-ruling-coalition-green-law/ - von Platten, J., Davies, K., Kilpeläinen, S., Vornicu, A., Ambrose, A., & Palm, J. (2025). From warming bodies to heating spaces: Using feminist energy justice and oral histories to unpack home heating transitions in Europe, 1945-present. Energy Research & Social Science, 121,
103974 . 10.1016/j.erss.2025.103974 - Wågström, A., & Michael, K. (2023). Caring for energy, energy to care: Exploring the energy-care nexus through examples from Sweden and India. Energy Research & Social Science, 99,
103042 . - Wilkie, S., Cheng, Q., Mathews, C., Otify, A., Schofield, F. J., Weir, E., Marshall, P., & O’Kane, A. A. (2025, July). The work to make a heat pump work–Investigation into the adoption of domestic heat pumps through social practice and complex systems. In Proceedings of the ACM SIGCAS/SIGCHI Conference on Computing and Sustainable Societies (pp. 131–142).
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5334/bc.816 | Journal eISSN: 2632-6655
Language: English
Page range: 840 - 855
Submitted on: Mar 10, 2026
Accepted on: Jul 8, 2026
Published on: Aug 11, 2026
Published by: Ubiquity Press
In partnership with: Paradigm Publishing Services
Keywords:
© 2026 Jeltje van der Haer, Renate Schelwald, Freek de Haan, published by Ubiquity Press
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.