Abstract
Energy poverty is a serious problem affecting many people in the world. To address it and alleviate it, the first action is to identify and measure the intensity of the population living in this condition. This paper seeks to generate information regarding the actual state of energy poverty by answering the research question: is it possible to measure the intensity of energy poverty between different Latin American countries with sufficient and equivalent data? To achieve this, the Multidimensional Energy Poverty Index (MEPI), proposed by Nussbaumer et al., was used. The results present two levels of lack of access to energy services: Energy Poverty (EP) and Extreme Energy Poverty (EEP). The last one, is a concept introduced by the authors to evaluate energy poverty using MEPI. Results of people living on EP (EEP within parentheses) are as follow: Colombia 29% (18%), Dominican Republic 32% (14%), Guatemala 76% (61%), Haiti 98% (91%), Honduras 72% (59%), Mexico 30% (17%) and Peru 65% (42%). A clear correlation between the Human Development Index (HDI) and MEPI is displayed, however some countries have relatively high values for the HDI, but do not perform so well in the MEPI and vice versa. Further investigation is needed.
Highlights
Energy is needed to provide cooked food, comfortable temperatures, lighting, drinking water and drainage, essential medical care and basic material for education and communication, while enabling all kinds of devices to be used
For Mexico, with a deprivation limit k of 0.3, 10,518 dwellings are facing energy poverty, which corresponds to the 15.2% of the evaluated dwellings, dealing with an average intensity of 0.5
In Mexico, 29.7% of the population is living on energy poverty, lacking at least one of the basic energy services; whilst the country has 16.5% of persons facing extreme energy poverty, which means that lack a minimum of 30% of the services
Summary
Energy is needed to provide cooked food, comfortable temperatures, lighting, drinking water and drainage, essential medical care and basic material for education and communication, while enabling all kinds of devices to be used. Energy services enable productive activities such as agriculture, trade, manufacturing, industry and mining to occur, and the lack of energy access can contribute to poverty and privations, as well as economic decay [1,2]. Seeking to have a general understanding of the concept, the World Energy Assessment defined energy poverty as the absence of sufficient choice in accessing adequate, affordable, reliable, high-quality, safe, and environmentally benign energy services to support economic and human development [1]. The Human Development Index (HDI) is assumed to be related to the energy consumption. HDI is assessed by life expectancy at birth; mean of years of schooling for adults aged 25 years and more, and expected years of schooling for children of school entering age; and the gross national income per capita [6]; living standard is related to energy services
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
