UK domestic energy facts, follow-up to #257/#258: DESNZ consumption totals, average prices paid, ONS 04.5 sub-classes, NEED 2024 and gas-connected households #270

Summary

PR #258 closed #257 with the Ofgem cap-level matrix and the NEED 2023 headline tables, and Microcosm's #890 spine half (PolicyEngine/microcosm#927) now rakes the imputed domestic energy columns in kWh to the NEED means and prices them at the FY2024-25 cap levels with standing charges. The receipts of that work (microcosm experiments/890-fuel-bus-energy-receipts.md, Parts N–S) measure the result against the bound ONS 04.5 household spend and find a gap the vendored facts cannot close: at design weights the frame pays about GBP 52bn for electricity and gas (97 TWh and 323 TWh; GBP 9.4bn of it standing charges) against ONS 04.5's GBP 42.3bn in 2024, which also carries other fuels. The pieces are different measurements, not one error: NEED means are 2023 volumes per metered dwelling with valid readings, the cap is a maximum price for direct-debit default-tariff customers, ONS is money actually paid by every household in the base year, and the diary-derived gas signal puts 96.5 % of households on gas against roughly 85 % with a meter. María's ruling on microcosm#927 (2026-09-15) is to stop fencing the calibrated frame on NEED and to close the gap with facts that measure our concept; this asks for them.

Chronicle owns preserved publisher artifacts, source cells and emitted facts; the raking, pricing, period and geography translation and the calibration bindings stay in Microcosm.

1. DESNZ domestic electricity and gas consumption totals (the volume level)

• What landed: NEED 2023 mean kWh by income band, tenure, property type and region (E&W) and by income band, tenure and property type (Scotland): the shape, per metered dwelling with valid readings, 2023 only.
• Requested: DESNZ Energy Trends domestic consumption by year (electricity, table 5.5 or the annual DUKES 5.2 series; gas, table 4.1 or DUKES 4.2), temperature-actual, calendar years 2022 to the latest quarter, GB or UK as published with the domestic sector stated; and the DESNZ subnational electricity and gas consumption statistics (domestic consumption and number of domestic meters by region and local authority, 2023 and 2024 when released), which also give the gas-connected household count (item 5).
• Closes: the level of the consumer's kWh rake. NEED would carry only the relative cell means; the national total would come from the actual-year consumption series, so the volume no longer inherits NEED's valid-reading selection or its 2023 vintage.

2. DESNZ Quarterly Energy Prices: average domestic prices paid (the price level)

• What landed: Ofgem cap levels at nil and benchmark consumption by region, payment method and quarter, 2024-Q1 to 2026-Q4 — a regulated maximum, not a price paid.
• Requested: the QEP domestic tables of average unit costs and fixed (standing) costs for electricity and gas by payment method (direct debit, standard credit, prepayment) and by region, quarterly and annual, 2023 to the latest (the "average unit costs and fixed costs" and "average annual domestic bills" tables in the QEP collection, https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/quarterly-energy-prices), with the consumption assumption each bill table states.
• Closes: pricing at what households actually paid, including fixed-deal customers below the cap, in the base year; the cap matrix stays as the regional shape and the maximum.

3. ONS Consumer Trends: the 04.5 sub-classes

• What landed: ons.household_expenditure.electricity_gas_other_fuels (COICOP 04.5) by calendar year.
• Requested: the same series for 04.5.1 electricity, 04.5.2 gas, 04.5.3 liquid fuels and 04.5.4 solid fuels (current prices, calendar years 2020 to the latest; quarterly as published), with coicop as the dimension the 04CN rows already carry.
• Closes: a calibration target per fuel that matches the consumer's two columns, and the other-fuels share left out of the comparison rather than inflating it.

4. NEED 2024 when published

• Requested: the next NEED consumption release (the 2024 consumption year) with the same headline tables now vendored (5b/6b, 9b/10b, 11b/12b, 15b/16b for England and Wales; the Scotland equivalents), so the shape matches the base year.
• Closes: the vintage half of the volume gap (2024 was warmer than 2023).

5. Gas-connected households

• What landed: nothing on connection; the consumer infers it from the LCFS diary's combined-payment split, which marks 96.5 % of households.
• Requested: domestic gas meter points by region and local authority from the DESNZ subnational gas statistics (item 1's second source), and the Census 2021 central-heating table for England and Wales (TS046, households by type of central heating) with the Scotland 2022 equivalent, so the consumer's connected share is a published fact by area.
• Closes: the connection share used for the gas rake population and the gas standing charge (an 85 % share alone moves the frame from GBP 52.3bn to GBP 49.6bn).

Not asked

• Ofgem's typical-consumption values and the cap levels themselves (already vendored).
• Household counts (ONS households by region are already in the feed).

Context

• Consumer: microcosm packages/microcosm-build/src/microcosm/build/uk_runtime/energy_pricing.py and lcfs_consumption.py (stage lcfs_consumption, operations iterative_proportional_fit with margins_resource: need_energy_facts.json and price_energy_at_cap), calibration target ons.household_energy_expenditure bound in microcosm#904.
• Measured gap and its decomposition: microcosm#927, receipts Parts N, P, Q and S, and the discussion of 2026-09-15 on that PR.
• Once packaged, Microcosm vendors the rows with tools/vendor_uk_ledger_facts.py, rakes NEED as shape and DESNZ as level, prices at QEP averages, binds 04.5.1 and 04.5.2, and records the concept residual in the receipts.

🤖 Filed with Claude Code