The EU Is Struggling to Counter Energy Poverty

The European Union’s Energy Poverty Alleviation Framework needs to be implemented swiftly and accurately in order to make a difference to vulnerable communities, according to an analysis by energy policy NGO the Regulatory Assistance Project.

The author of the report, Louise Sutherland, noted that despite copious efforts on the part of the EU to reduce energy poverty, the number of households finding it hard to pay their bills rose considerably between 2021 and 2022 due to the energy crunch that began in the autumn of 2021 and increased significantly in severity following the start of the war in the Ukraine.

In response to the 35% increase in energy poverty resulting from these events, the EU devised a framework that must be implemented immediately to have an effect, Sutherland wrote.

The framework is a marked departure from previous approaches to energy poverty alleviation, which focused on financial support for energy bills. Now, the EU is betting on energy use reductions and a move away from oil and gas.

A reduction in energy use is normally a natural consequence of energy price inflation and, one may argue, a symptom of energy poverty. In other words, the European Union appears to be redefining energy poverty in a bid to motivate people to consume less energy—which they are already doing because they can’t afford it.

Gas prices in Europe, while significantly lower than they were at the peak of the crunch in 2022 are still twice as high as they were before that. What’s more, the EU’s green energy plans are about to push energy bills even higher as buildings and transportation get included in the emissions trading system of the bloc.

“It remains to be seen if these [measures] are truly effective, and we have seen predictions that the price around and beyond 2030 could rise significantly,” Sutherland said, as quoted by the Energy Mix. “So we need very swift action this decade to support households that are most at risk if the price rises.”

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com

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