Conceptualising energy use and energy poverty using a capabilities framework

By Rosie Day, G. Walker, N. Simcock. 2016

664 citations recorded by the source corpus.

In this article we conceptualise energy use from a capabilities perspective, informed by the work of Amartya Sen, Martha Nussbaum and others following them. Building on this, we suggest a corresponding definition of energy poverty, as understood in the capabilities space. We argue that such an understanding provides a theoretically coherent means of comprehending the relationship between energy and wellbeing, and thus conceptualising energy deprivation, that makes sense across settings including both the global North and South: a coherence which has previously been lacking. At the same time, it has the flexibility to be deployed in a way that is sensitive to local contexts. Understanding energy use in the capabilities space also provides a means for identifying multiple sites of intervention, including some areas that are currently largely overlooked. We argue that this is advantageous for attempts to address energy poverty in the context of climate change and imperatives for the containment of aggregate energy consumption.

Subfields: Nutrition and Dietetics, Pollution, Safety Research

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/e8e857716245e58a8d1e46a44d031c54924720a5

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Citations in the corpus

Providing decent living with minimum energy: A global scenario (2020, background): “Fortunately, recent advances have been made in both theory (Rao and Baer, 2012; Day et al., 2016; BrandCorrea and Steinberger, 2017) and estimation (Rao et al.”
Counting energy poverty in Spain between 2004 and 2015 (2018, background): “In the literature there is not a universally accepted definition of energy poverty or fuel poverty (see Pachauri et al., 2004; Pachauri and Spreng, 2011; Li et al., 2015; Day et al., 2016).”
Energy Poverty and Its Implication on Standard of Living in Kirinyaga, Kenya (2018, background): “Lack of energy restricts labour productivity [40].”
Assessing the extent and intensity of energy poverty using Multidimensional Energy Poverty Index: Empirical evidence from households in India (2017, methodology): “1 See, for example, Pachuri et al. (2004), Pachauri and Spreng (2011), Wang et al. (2015) and Day et al. (2016) for various definitions and approaches to the measurement of energy poverty.”
Energy poverty vulnerability index: A multidimensional tool to identify hotspots for local action (2019, neutral): “Besides, several authors have been exploring various dimensions of EP, focusing on the social and health di-mension of the problem (e.g. Day et al., 2016; Gillard et al., 2017; Thomsonetal.,2017a,b),economicandexpenditureside(e.g. Hills, 2012; E-Control, 2013; ONPE, 2014), geography (e.g. Anusi and…”
Energy poverty and social relations: A capabilities approach (2019, background): “people’s social relations impact on the complex and multi-faceted experience of energy poverty in the UK (see [4]).”
Capturing the multifaceted nature of energy poverty: Lessons from Belgium (2018, background): “the combination of different factors that limits the adaptation capabilities (Dubois, 2012; Day et al., 2016) of the concerned households).”
The policy implications of energy poverty indicators (2018, background): “…relevant contributions come from the UK (Boardman, 2012; Hills, 2011; Moore, 2012a; Guertler, 2012; Healy and Clinch, 2004; Hutchinson et al., 2006; Day et al., 2016) some other assessments can be found in the literature coming from other European countries as well (Bouzarovski et al., 2012;…”
Energy justice: a policy approach (2017, neutral): “A number of different approaches have emerged to exploring the social dimensions of energy supply and use, including actor network theory, assemblages, and capabilities approaches, amongst others (see Wong 2016; Day and Walker 2013; Day et al. 2016).”
Energy poverty indicators: A critical review of methods (2017, background): “) exist beyond domestic energy services.(54) Despite the above, income/expenditure-based indicators are well suited to capture all domestic energy services as they consider all end uses.”
The political economy of car dependence: A systems of provision approach (2020, background): “Finally, by highlighting the constituent elements of car-dependent transport systems, this review lays out a theoretical framework which could inform ongoing research into the energy requirements of wellbeing [5,7,13,25,67].”