Governance of electricity consumption behavior in Iran: from gaps in technical and behavioral policies to policy makers understanding

Todays, because of the household sector consumption amount, the role of individual consumption behavior has been highlighted in energy policy. Although various tools has been designed to intervene energy consumption behavior, existence of some problems in energy management sector indicates that at the national level, understanding of behaviors and how to change and manage them has been pursued in an incomplete manner. This research, by adopting a qualitative approach and turning from focuse on factors affecting consumer behavior to behavior governance, aims to investigate how energy consumption behavior is managed. The process of data collection was done through individual interviews and focus group with electricity industry managers. The result of using thematic analysis, showed that there is two types of gaps within and between energy technical and behavioral policies, which warns the need to change in the current approach and reformulate policies in order to create integrity and balance in energy consumption behavior governance. Article emphasize the use of behavioral insights is not limited to the use of behavioral tools to solve problems; rather, it requires improvement of policy makers understanding of problems based on behavioral insights.