The 2011 Summer Study: Growth in participation with maintained event quality

The 2011 issue of the Summer Study was entitled Energy efficiency first: The foundation of a low-carbon society. The 2011 Summer Study – the 10^th since 1993 – reinforced the position of the conference as Europe’s premier event for information exchange and networking on energy efficiency.

At the Summer Study, the energy efficiency policy of tomorrow is formulated. The 2011 edition of the eceee Summer Study was held at Presqu’île de Giens near Hyères in Southern France 6–11 June 2011.

The heart of the Summer Study is the presentation and discussion of refereed papers in parallel panel sessions. Posters are presented in a session attended by all participants. Keynote speakers address plenary sessions and participants can organise informal sessions in the afternoons.

“This is the only place where you can find energy efficiency people from all the different worlds (industry, consultancies, universities, etc.) and fields (engineering, social sciences, economy, finance, lobbying, etc.). And the organisation of the conference makes it the best place for real exchanges between everybody. When you come back home after the conference, you get enough new ideas to work on for the two years before the next one!” (Participant's comment from the evaluation)

A few highlights

• This year’s event attracted 400 participants who spent five intense days listening to presentations and debating them, setting up and participating in informal sessions and around the clock networking.
• The number of submitted abstracts has also grown by approximately 25 % for each event, reaching 507 abstracts in 2011, with a total of 221 final papers included in the conference proceedings.
• The content of the conference continues to receive consistently high average ratings: proceedings 4,4 (4,4 in 2009), panel sessions 4,2 (4,2), poster session 3,6 (3,4), informal sessions 3,8 (3,9), Graffiti conference newsletter 4,4 (4,2). The plenary session showed a significant improvement in rating at 3,5, up from 3,0 in 2009. All papers and plenary presentations are available on eceee’s web site: www.eceee.org/summer_study
• The pre-conference registration and paper submissions process received high average ratings, despite the introduction of a new on-line system to cope with the increased volume of abstracts. The paper process received a slightly lower rating at 4,2 (4,4 in 2009). The registration process received 4,2 (4,0).
• The move to a new venue was highly appreciated by conference participants, although the location close to Toulon presented logistical challenges to both participants and organisers. The accommodation saw a dramatic increase in the rating at 4,4 compared to 3,1 in 2009, whereas the rating of meals improved to 4,0 (3,5). The general organisation receives a very high 4,6 (4,4) average rating and the on-site organisation a high 4,5 (4,3) rating.
• A global assessment of the event (average of the respective average for each question) places the 2011 event on an all time high (4,1 out of 5) together with the 2005 event, which was considerably smaller.
• Although the number of participants keeps increasing, the distribution among countries remains uneven. Participants from Denmark, France, Germany, Norway, the Netherlands Sweden and the UK makes up about 2/3 of the total attendance. The Brussels energy efficiency community have started to attend the event to a much greater degree, which is encouraging. Participants from Southern and Eastern Europe are far too few. Non-European participants, mainly from the US, make up a little more than 10 % of the total. The affiliation of participants represents a good mix of researchers, practitioners, private sector, energy agencies and NGOs.
• The 2011 Summer Study has managed to attract many first time visitors. 59 % of the attendees attended the event for the first time, compared to 44 % in 2009.

Evaluation results
The evaluation results are based on the answers of 289 people (72 % of the conference participants) in the online evaluation tool (this is also an all time high). Respondents were asked to rate a large number of topics from 1 to 5 (5 being the highest rating) by ticking one option only. They could also write additional comments on every topic. The below table summarises a few key areas regarding the content of the conference.

* 2001 averages were derived from three verbal levels, where answers marked "not interesting" were attributed the numerical value 1, "interesting" the value 3 and "very interesting" the value 5.

Proceedings – the written legacy

A positive result over the longer term is that proceedings have consistently been rated very high, and that the high standard has been maintained over the years. (The slight drop in 2003 is still acceptable considering the unforeseen effect that some respondents seem to have commented on the size of the printed book, rather than on the contents.)

The consistent quality of the proceedings is particularly important, since they represent the written legacy of the summer study and is the product available for those who are not able to participate.

Download the 2011 summer study evaluation (pdf file)
Download the 2009 summer study evaluation (pdf file)
Download the 2007 summer study evaluation (pdf file)
Download the 2005 summer study evaluation (pdf file)
Download the 2003 summer study evaluation (pdf file)
Download the 2001 summer study evaluation (pdf file)
Download the 1999 summer study evaluation (pdf file)