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Energy poverty, or fuel poverty, is often defined as a situation where low-income households are not able to adequately provide basic energy services in their homes and for their transport at affordable cost. A widely used criterion is to consider a household in fuel poverty when it spends more than 10% of its income on energy.

But there is no consensus on a unique and explicit definition of the phenomenon as it is complex and has different causes and effects (temperature feelings, restriction behaviour…).

Still, fuel poverty is a major issue in emerging as well as in developed countries. In Europe, around 20% of households (i.e. ~50 million) were considered affected by fuel poverty in 2018. Because of this situation, there is a growing concern on energy poverty which results in a multiplication of policy measures to address the issue.

This brief is prepared by Bruno Lapillonne, Marie Rousselot and Alexandre Katsenis and based on a presentation with Conuee, AFD and ADEME.

Existing policies and measures (P&Ms)

To address fuel poverty, the most common approach is to reduce energy prices for these types of households with social tariffs, subsidies, or the diffusion of prepaid meters.

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OPEC has released its World Oil Outlook 2019, including long-term projections and assessment for the global oil and energy industry. According to the OPEC, total primary energy demand would increase by 25% between 2018 and 2040.

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Angola’s National Oil, Gas and Biofuels Agency (ANPG) has formed a consortium with five international oil companies to expand gas input for the 5.2 Mt/year Angola LNG onshore liquefaction plant in Soyo, whose supply has been declining in recent years. …

Irish renewable project developer Mainstream Renewable Power has reached financial close for the first phase of its 1.3 GW Andes Renovables wind and solar power project in Chile.