Identifying emerging consumer-facing technology trends likely to impact the future energy system and residential sector. This report represents the key output of work package 2 of the Scenarios for Future Living project – reimagining how to plan for energy in Australia. Drawing on a review of 93 reports, interviews with 20 experts, and ethnographic qualitative research conducted at nine conferences and expos, the report identifies emerging trends across sectors including health technology; disability advocacy; construction; heating, ventilation and air-conditioning; and digital and energy technologies. It catalogues and analyses trends likely to shape the future energy system, with a particular focus on implications for residential energy demand.

The trends are organised into large-scale macro-trends with cross-sectoral impacts, alongside more specific everyday practice trends linked to everyday household life. These are then presented as synthesised industry visions, which bring macro-trends and everyday practices together in a speculative form to illustrate how these dynamics may play out in everyday life, presented through AI-generated images.