In developing countries and some areas of more developed countries, energy poverty is lack of access to modern energy services in the home. In 2022, 759 million people lacked access to consistent electricity and 2.6 billion people used dangerous and inefficient cooking systems. Their well-being is negatively affected by very low consumption of energy, use of dirty or polluting fuels, and excessive time spent collecting fuel to meet basic needs.
Predominant indices for measuring the complex nature of energy poverty include the Energy Development Index (EDI), the Multidimensional Energy Poverty Index (MEPI), and Energy Poverty Index (EPI). Both binary and multidimensional measures of energy poverty are required to establish indicators that simplify the process of measuring and tracking energy poverty globally. Energy poverty often exacerbates existing vulnerabilities amongst underprivileged communities and negatively impacts public and household health, education, and women's opportunities.
According to the Energy Poverty Action initiative of the World Economic Forum, "Access to energy is fundamental to improving quality of life and is a key imperative for economic development. In the developing world, energy poverty is still rife." As a result of this situation, the United Nations (UN) launched the Sustainable Energy for All Initiative and designated 2012 as the International Year for Sustainable Energy for All, which had a major focus on reducing energy poverty.
The term energy poverty is also sometimes used in the context of developed countries to mean an inability to afford energy in the home. This concept is also known as fuel poverty, household energy insecurity or energy hardship.
Description
Many people in developing countries do not have modern energy infrastructure. They have heavily relied on traditional biomass such as wood fuel, charcoal, crop residue, and wood pellets. Although some developing countries like the BRICS have neared the energy-related technological level of developed countries and have financial power, most developing countries are still dominated by traditional biomass. According to the International Energy Agency, "use of traditional biomass will decrease in many countries, but is likely to increase in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa alongside population growth." UK Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology. "Access to energy in developing countries," December 2002 Number 191. An energy ladder shows the improvement of energy use corresponding to an increase in the household income. Basically, as income increases, the energy types used by households would be cleaner and more efficient but more expensive as moving from traditional biomass to electricity. "Households at lower levels of income and development tend to be at the bottom of the energy ladder, using fuel that is cheap and locally available but not very clean nor efficient. According to the World Health Organization, over three billion people worldwide are at these lower rungs, depending on biomass fuels—crop waste, dung, wood, leaves, etc.—and coal to meet their energy needs. A disproportionate number of these individuals reside in Asia and Africa: 95% of the population in Afghanistan uses these fuels, 95% in Chad, 87% in Ghana, 82% in India, 80% in China, and so forth. As incomes rise, we would expect that households would substitute to higher-quality fuel choices. However, this process has been quite slow. In fact, the World Bank reports that the use of biomass for all energy sources has remained constant at about 25% since 1975." Esther Duflo, Michael Greenstone and Rema Hanna. "Indoor air pollution, health and economic well-being," SAPIENS, 2008 : Vol.1 / n°1
Causes One cause of energy poverty is lack of modern energy infrastructure like power plants, transmission lines, and underground pipelines to deliver energy resources such as natural gas. When infrastructure does make modern energy available, its cost may be out of reach for poorer households, so they avoid using it.Krauss, Alexander. 2016. How natural gas tariff increases can influence poverty: Results, measurement constraints and bias . Vol. 60. Energy Economics.
Units of analysis
Domestic energy poverty Domestic energy poverty refers to a situation where a household does not have access or cannot afford to have the basic energy or energy services to achieve day to day living requirements. These requirements can change from country to country and region to region. The most common needs are lighting, cooking energy, domestic heating or cooling.Krauss, Alexander. 2016. How natural gas tariff increases can influence poverty: Results, measurement constraints and bias . Vol. 60. Energy Economics. Other authors consider different categories of energy needs from "fundamental energy needs" associated to human survival and extremely poor situations. "Basic energy needs" required for attaining basic living standards, which includes all the functions in the previous (cooking, heating and lighting) and, in addition energy to provide basic services linked to health, education and communications. "Energy needs for productive uses" when additionally basic energy needs the user requires energy to make a living; and finally "Energy for recreation", when the user has fulfilled the previous categories and needs energy for enjoyment."Sanchez T; The Hidden Energy Crisis, 2010 Practical Action Publishing 2010 Until recently energy poverty definitions took only the minimum energy quantity required into consideration when defining energy poverty, but a different school of thought is that not only energy quantity but the quality and cleanliness of the energy used Stoppok, M., Jess, A., Freitag, R., Alber, E.; Of culture, consumption and cost: A comparative analysis of household energy consumption in Kenya, Germany and Spain, Energy Research & Social Science, Volume 40, June 2018, Pages 127-139, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.erss.2017.12.004 should be taken into consideration when defining energy poverty.
One such definition reads as: "A person is in 'energy poverty' if they do not have access to at least: (a) the equivalent of 35 kg LPG for cooking per capita per year from liquid and/or gas fuels or from improved supply of solid fuel sources and improved (efficient and clean) cook stoves and (b) 120kWh electricity per capita per year for lighting, access to most basic services (drinking water, communication, improved health services, education improved services and others) plus some added value to local production
An 'improved energy source' for cooking is one which requires less than 4 hours person per week per household to collect fuel, meets the recommendations WHO for air quality (maximum concentration of CO of 30 mg/M3 for 24 hours periods and less than 10 mg/ M3 for periods 8 hours of exposure), and the overall conversion efficiency is higher than 25%. "
Composite indices
Energy Development Index (EDI) First introduced in 2004 by the International Energy Agency (IEA), the Energy Development Index (EDI) aims to measure a country's transition to modern fuels. It is calculated as the weighted average of four indicators: "1) Per capita commercial energy consumption as an indicator of the overall economic development of a country; 2) Per capita consumption of electricity in the residential sector as a metric of electricity reliability and customers׳ ability to financially access it; 3) Share of modern fuels in total residential energy sector consumption to indicate access to modern cooking fuels; 4) Share of population with access to electricity." (The EDI was modeled after the Human Development Index (HDI).) Because the EDI is calculated as the average of indicators which measure the quality and quantity of energy services at a national level, the EDI provides a metric that provides an understanding of the national level of energy development. At the same time, this means that the EDI is not well-equipped to describe energy poverty at a household level.
Multidimensional Energy Poverty Index (MEPI) Measures whether an individual is energy poor or rich based on how intensely they experience energy deprivation. Energy deprivation is categorized by seven indicators: "access to light, modern cooking fuel, fresh air, refrigeration, recreation, communication, and space cooling." An individual is considered energy poor if they experience a predetermined number of energy deprivations. The MEPI is calculated by multiplying the ratio of people identified as energy poor to the total sample size and the average intensity of energy deprivation of the energy poor. Some strengths of the MEPI is that it takes into account the number of energy poor along with the intensity of their energy poverty. On the other hand, because it collects data at a household or individual level, it is harder to understand the broader national context.
Energy Poverty Index (EPI) Developed by Mirza and Szirmai in their 2010 study to measure energy poverty in Pakistan, the Energy Poverty Index (EPI) is calculated by averaging the energy shortfall and energy inconvenience of a household. Energy inconvenience is measured through indicators such as: "Frequency of buying or collecting a source of energy; Distance from household traveled; Means of transport used; Household member's involvement in energy acquisition; Time spent on energy collection per week; Household health; Children's involvement in energy collection." Energy shortfall is measured as the lack of sufficient energy to meet basic household needs. This index weighs more heavily the impact of the usability of energy services rather than its access. Similar to the MEPI, the EPI collects data at a micro-level which lends to greater understanding of energy poverty at the household level.
Critiques of measuring energy poverty Energy poverty is challenging to define and measure because energy services cannot be measured concretely and there are no universal standards of what are considered basic energy services. Energy poverty is too complex to work and measure with an indicator and framework that is internationally accepted in a global context. Therefore, binary measures and multidimensional measures of energy poverty are required to consolidate and establish indicators that simplify the process of measuring and tracking energy poverty globally. There is no homogenous definition and international measure to use as a standard globally, even the definition of energy poverty is not the same among countries in the European Union.Pablo, Quishpe Sinailin, et al. "Energy Poverty in Ecuador." Sustainability, vol. 11, 11 Nov. 2019, p. 6320, https://doi.org/10.3390/su11226320
Intersectional issues Energy poverty often exacerbates existing vulnerabilities amongst already disadvantaged communities. For instance, energy poverty negatively impacts women's health, threatens the quality and quantity of children's education, and damages household and public health.
Gender