Ex-post evaluation of local energy efficiency and demand-side management operations - State of the art, bottom-up methods, applied examples and approach for the development of an evaluation practical culture

Energy end-use Efficiency (EE) is a priority for energy policies to face resources exhaustion and to reduce pollutant emissions. At the same time, in France, local level is increasingly involved into the implementation of EE activities, whose frame is changing (energy market liberalization, new policy instruments). Needs for ex-post evaluation of the local EE activities are thus increasing, for regulation requirements and to support a necessary change of scale. Our thesis focuses on the original issue of the ex-post evaluation of local EE operations in France. The state of the art, through the analysis of the American and European experiences and of the reference guidebooks, gives a substantial methodological material and emphasises the key evaluation issues. Concurrently, local EE operations in France are characterized by an analysis of their environment and a work on their segmentation criteria. The combination of these criteria with the key evaluation issues provides an analysis framework used as the basis for the composition of evaluation methods. This also highlights the specific evaluation needs for local operations. A methodology is then developed to complete and adapt the existing material to design evaluation methods for local operations, so that stakeholders can easily appropriate. Evaluation results thus feed a know-how building process with experience feedback. These methods are to meet two main goals: to determine the operation results, and to detect the success/failure factors. The methodology was validated on concrete cases, where these objectives were reached. (author)