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Climate change is arguably the defining issue of our time, with global impacts. Yet to date, scholarship within social policy has remained relatively fragmented and disparate, leaving an urgent need to start comprehensively embedding environmental thinking across all domains of the discipline (Williams, 2021). Responding to this challenge, this paper draws together existing work at the nexus of social policy, the environment, and climate change. The paper then presents findings from workshops held with social policy scholars, policymakers, and practitioners, using these discussions to propose pathways to embed climate change within the discipline. The paper represents a significant contribution to knowledge within the field as it seeks to both broaden discussions about social policy and climate change; to identify theoretical and empirical relationships that exist between the two fields but have not been fully recognised in existing scholarship; and to bring new perspectives and voices into the discussion.

This paper scrutinizes existing policy efforts to address energy poverty at the governance scale of the European Union (EU) and its constituent Member States. Our main starting point is the recent expansion of energy poverty policies at the EU level, fuelled by the regulatory provisions of the Clean Energy for all Europeans Package, as well as the establishment of an EU Energy Poverty Observatory. Aided by a systematic and customized methodology, we survey the extensive scientific body of work that has recently been published on the topic, as well as the multiple strategies and measures to address energy poverty that have been formulated across the EU. This includes the principal mitigation approaches adopted by key European and national institutions. We develop a framework to judge the distributional and procedural justice provisions within the recently adopted National Energy and Climate Plans, as an indicator of the power, ability and resolve of relevant institutions to combat the causes and consequences of energy injustice. We also provide a research and policy agenda for future action, highlighting a series of scientific and decision-making challenges in the European and global context.

Despite growing pan-European interest in and awareness of the wide-ranging health and well-being impacts of energy poverty—which is characterised by an inability to secure adequate levels of energy services in the home—the knowledge base is largely British-centric and dominated by single-country studies. In response, this paper investigates the relationship between energy poverty, health and well-being across 32 European countries, using 2012 data from the European Quality of Life Survey. We find an uneven concentration of energy poverty, poor health, and poor well-being across Europe, with Eastern and Central Europe worst affected. At the intersection of energy poverty and health, there is a higher incidence of poor health (both physical and mental) amongst the energy poor populations of most countries, compared to non-energy poor households. Interestingly, we find the largest disparities in health and well-being levels between energy poor and non-energy poor households occur within relatively equal societies, such as Sweden and Slovenia. As well as the unique challenges brought about by rapidly changing energy landscapes in these countries, we also suggest the relative deprivation theory and processes of social comparison hold some value in explaining these findings.

Energy poverty – which has also been recognised via terms such as 'fuel poverty' and 'energy vulnerability' – occurs when a household experiences inadequate levels of energy services in the home. Measuring energy poverty is challenging, as it is a culturally sensitive and private condition, which is temporally and spatially dynamic. This is compounded by the limited availability of appropriate data and indicators, and lack of consensus on how energy poverty should be conceptualised and measured. Statistical indicators of energy poverty are an important and necessary part of the research and policy landscape. They carry great political weight, and are often used to guide the targeting of energy poverty measures – due to their perceived objectivity – with important consequences for both the indoor and built environment of housing. Focussing on the European Union specifically, this paper critically assesses the available statistical options for monitoring energy poverty, whilst also presenting options for improving existing data. This is examined through the lens of vulnerability thinking, by considering the ways in which policies and institutions, the built fabric and everyday practices shape energy use, alongside the manner in which energy poor households experience and address the issue on a day-to-day basis.

The European Commission has stated that it does not support a European definition of fuel poverty, and that a common definition would be inappropriate due to the diverse energy contexts found across the European Union. Using official EU policy documents from 2001 to 2014, this paper will demonstrate that contrary to the European Commission's stance, many of the EU institutions and consultative committees are in favour of a common European definition of fuel poverty, and have been arguing for the establishment of a definition for at least seven years. This paper will argue that a definition is vital for raising the profile of fuel poverty and ensuring it is recognised as a policy issue by all Member States of the EU, particularly at a time of rising energy prices, stagnating wages and growing concerns about energy security and climate change.

There is limited evidence that explicitly considers the relationship between fuel poverty and disabled people. Additionally, within English policy, disabled people are treated as a single group with homogenous needs, despite both highly varied needs and eligibility for fuel poverty or welfare support. Given this gap in knowledge the paper investigates the relationship between fuel poverty and disabled people in the context of policy change. The paper reports research on: the extent of fuel poverty among households containing disabled people; the relationship between tenure, disability and fuel poverty; and the relationship between fuel poverty policy support and disabled people.

The recent polycrises of COVID-19, economic recession, and energy price increases have reinforced the critical importance of energy services – such as heating, information and communications technology, and refrigeration – to everyday societal functioning. Compromising access to these energy services, or energy poverty, limits social and economic development affecting education, health, and social participation. Energy poverty is impacted by climate change and climate-related policies – however, this nexus has been marginalised within social policy. We critically review literature at the intersection of climate change and energy poverty identifying policy approaches, tensions, and solutions of relevance for social policy. While tensions exist between efforts to mitigate climate change and energy poverty, climate-friendly mitigation of energy poverty requires better integration of social perspectives to disrupt current technical biases, recognising the characteristics and needs of individuals in energy poverty, and holistic governance approaches, especially involving the health and housing sectors.

This paper explores the popular idea of a 'heat or eat' dilemma existing for some households. The mixed-methods research finds that there is a relationship between not being able to heat the home and not being able to eat well. However, it appears that households struggle to do either, and there is considerable nuance in household decisions around energy use. Qualitative data analysis indicates the importance of energy billing periods, household composition and social and familial networks in terms of shaping household experiences and responses. The findings challenge the established idea that food and fuel are elastic household expenditures.

Introduction / Stefan Bouzarovski, Neil Simcock, Harriet Thomson, and Saska Petrova -- Energy poverty in an intersectional perspective : on multiple deprivation, discriminatory systems and the effects of policies / Katrin Grossmann and Antje Kahlheber -- Understanding energy poverty through the energy cultures framework / Fatima McKague, Rob Lawson, Michelle Scott, and Ben Wooliscroft -- Transcending the triad : political distrust, local cultural norms and reconceptualising the drivers of domestic energy poverty in the UK / Irena L.C. Connon -- Post-apartheid spatial inequalities and the built environment : drivers of energy vulnerability for the urban poor in South Africa / Abigail J. Knox, Jiska R. De Groot, and Nthabi Mohlakoana -- Water-energy nexus vulnerabilities in China : infrastructures, policies, practices / Alison Browne, Saska Petrova, and Beth Brockett -- Rethinking energy deprivation in Athens : a spatial approach / Evangelia Chatzikonstantinou and Fereniki Vatavali -- Location, location, location : what accounts for the regional variation of energy poverty in Poland? / Maciej Lis, Agata Miazga, and Katarzyna Salach -- Multiple vulnerabilities? : interrogating the spatial distribution of energy poverty measures in England / Caitlin Robinson, Stefan Bouzarovski, and Sarah Lindley -- The triple-hit effect of disability and energy poverty : a qualitative case study of painful sickle cell disease and cold homes / Anna Cronin de Chavez -- The value of experience : including young people in energy poverty research / Kimberley C. O'Sullivan, Helen Viggers, and Philippa Howden-Chapman -- Energy poverty in the western Balkans: adjusting policy responses to socio-economic drivers / Slavica Robic, Ivana Rogulj, and Branko Ancic -- Lighting up rural Kenya : lessons learnt from rural electrification programmes / Dorice Agol -- Urban energy poverty : South Africa's policy response to the challenge / Peta Wolpe and Yachika Reddy -- Conclusions / Neil Simcock, Harriet Thomson, Saska Petrova, and Stefan Bouzarovski -- Index

This article presents the results of the COVID Energy Map, a novel, global mapping exercise tracking global emergency responses undertaken by governments, regulators, utilities and companies in Global North and South, to mitigate energy vulnerability by keeping energy affordable and available. The map constitutes a comprehensive open access evidence-based database, so far collating over 380+ emergency measures, in over 120+ countries. This paper particularly shows and discusses how responses have been developing since March 2020, highlighting emerging longer-term concerns and strategies across Global North and South. In our view, the responses merit close attention as they reveal both the universal importance of household energy services access, and important underlying existing narratives and policy-making questions about energy as a vital basic need, service, or even a 'basic right'. In fact, the paper additionally examines whether and how COVID-19 responses seem to fall in step with a nascent global trend of (legal) recognition of 'rights to energy' in international, regional and national policy. The paper set outs this trend, and concludes that while COVID-19 responses clearly reflect a broad recognition of affordable, continuous energy services access as vital for basic human well-being and capabilities, a right to energy perspective additionally lays bare and gives shape to important concerns about: too minimal (insufficient) forms of modern energy access for some households, the non-inclusive and inequitable targetting of some measures, e.g. towards on-grid, off-grid, renewable, pre paid, or specific vulnerable consumers, and the role of the state and other actors, including energy companies.

ENGAGER 2017–2021, CA16232 ; Energy poverty, a condition whereby people cannot secure adequate home energy services, is gaining prominence in public discourse and on political and policy agendas. As its measurement is operationalised, metrical developments are being socially shaped. A European Union mandate for biennial reporting on energy poverty presents an opportunity to institutionalise new metrics and thus privilege certain measurements as standards. While combining indicators at multiple scales is desirable to measure multi-dimensional aspects, it entails challenges such as database availability, coverage and limited disaggregated resolution. This article converges scholarship on metrics e which problematises the act of measurement e and on energy poverty e which apprehends socio-political and techno-economic particulars. Scholarship on metrics suggests that any basket of indicators risks silencing significant but hard to measure aspects, or unwarrantedly privileging others. State-of-the-art energy poverty scholarship calls for indicators that represent contextualised energy use issues, including energy access and quality, expenditure in relation to income, built environment related aspects and thermal comfort levels, while retaining simplicity and comparability for policy traction. We frame energy poverty metrology as the socially shaped measurement of a varied, multi-dimensional phenomenon within historically bureaucratic and publicly distant energy sectors, and assess the risks and opportunities that must be negotiated. To generate actionable knowledge, we propose an analytical framework with five dimensions of energy poverty metrology, and illustrate it using multi-scalar cases from three European countries. Dimensions include historical trajectories, data flattening, contextualised identification, new representation and policy uptake. We argue that the measurement of energy poverty must be informed by the politics of data and scale in order to institutionalise emerging metrics, while safeguarding ...