In the coming months it will be important to save gas.

It is clear that high gas prices provide the strongest incentive to save gas.

However, many companies and households are protected from rising prices, so that the massive increases in energy prices on the wholesale markets only reach consumers with a delay.

In addition, extreme price adjustments are politically difficult to enforce.

So what can be done to support gas savings?

Here it is worth looking at measures motivated by behavioral economics.

You can increase the effect of price incentives by helping the recipients to implement energy-saving projects.

Research shows that this can result in savings of around 2 to 10 percent, and in some cases even up to 35 percent.

These "softer", non-price-based measures have various advantages: They do not lead to any direct financial burdens, do not require or prohibit anything, but rather preserve the scope for action.

They are also low-risk as they can be tried as part of short-term pilot testing.

Measures that work in the tests and are accepted can then be applied across the board.

Direct speeches

The recently launched campaign by the Federal Ministry of Economics to motivate society to save energy is therefore a step in the right direction.

What is important now is implementation that is as effective as possible: information campaigns are particularly effective if they are tailored to the addressees and provide useful, clearly understandable and implementable recommendations.

Direct addresses through letters or digital communication channels can be used to provide information about expected price increases or concrete savings tips.

Not only public institutions should be active, but a broad alliance of various actors such as consumer centers, energy suppliers or housing companies.

In connection with the information campaigns, other behavioral economic mechanisms should be used, such as social comparisons or self-commitments or setting goals.

By comparing the energy consumption of other households, consumers receive information about their own behavior ("How much gas can a similar household get by with?"), a social norm is addressed and the idea of ​​competition is awakened.

A common goal

Voluntary commitments and targets (“I will save 20 percent gas in the next few months”) create a point of reference and can help to achieve long-term goals due to their more binding nature.

They can also be linked to a short-term incentive system, such as savings bonuses for households and companies (“Anyone who achieves this goal receives a bonus”).

Regions that regularly have to work together to avoid bottlenecks such as temporary power or water shortages have usually managed to establish a social consensus, a common goal: In the coming years we have to save gas.

Feedback on the current gas consumption, ideally device-specific and in real time, is particularly promising.

Studies on technologies that make energy consumption visible while showering show savings of 15 to 35 percent.

The effect can be found even in hotels where customers have no financial incentive to save energy.

Device-specific real-time feedback also helps to save on power consumption.

In this way, the current consumption of the dryer, washing machine or air conditioner can be made visible and the effect of behavioral adjustments can be experienced.

Feedback will be difficult to implement across the board in the short term.

It could, however, help to regularly ask people to read gas consumption themselves and to offer an automated assessment of previous consumption behavior.

Overall, the motto is to make the success of behavioral adjustments as noticeable as possible.

This applies not least to a reduction in room heating in the cold seasons, which accounts for the largest share of household energy consumption.

Do information campaigns and behavioral economic measures always work?

Not at all, as our own studies have shown.

Nor are they a substitute for strong market incentives, but they are a useful complement, especially when used in a targeted manner.

Households and small and medium-sized businesses, such as bakeries, hotels, farms, have often paid little attention to their energy consumption.

Soft measures can support you in saving energy in the short term.

Ultimately, the biggest energy crisis in recent decades is about every percent of gas that we use less.

Mark A. Andor is head of the research group "Prosocial Behavior" RWI - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research.

Andreas Loechel is a professor for environmental/resource economics and sustainability at the Ruhr University Bochum and at the RWI – Leibniz Institute for Economic Research.