Ridding the world of ‘energy poverty’

Wikipedia defines poverty as the “general scarcity or dearth, or the state of one who lacks a certain amount of material possessions or money” and energy poverty as the “lack of access to modern energy services”. But the International Energy Agency (IEA) goes on to amplify this definition by adding that “these services are defined as household access to electricity and clean cooking facilities (e.g., fuels and stoves that do not cause air pollution in houses)”.

Therefore, energy poverty is a subsection of poverty and as long as there is poverty in the world there will be energy poverty as well.

The availability of energy is related to just about every activity in life, especially for the provision of water, health services, lighting, acclimatisation, cooking and so on. Work cannot be done without expending energy, as the second law of thermodynamics goes.

How big is the problem of energy poverty and what are the efforts needed to eradicate it or at least contain it? The IEA in its ‘World Energy Outlook 2014’ says that “nearly 1.3 billion people are without access to electricity and 2.7 billion people rely on the traditional use of biomass for cooking, which causes harmful indoor air pollution”.

The greater majority of these people are in sub-Saharan Africa and in Asia.

There are some efforts by international organisations, governments, industry and development banks to phase this problem out in accordance with the 2012 UN programme of ‘Decade of Sustainable Energy for All’, which calls for the eradication of energy poverty in the world by 2030.

But the task is proving to be more difficult and a race between anticipated progress and population growth. Therefore, even though a billion more people will be provided with electricity by 2040, the number of people without it in Africa is expected to be 635 million, more or less what it is now.

The same goes for clean cooking facilities, where solid biomass (wood, charcoal, and dung) still accounts for 50 per cent of sub-Saharan Africa consumption and is used in open primitive stoves with all the risks of inhaling the smoke. While modern fuels such as LPG and kerosene will make a great difference, more efficient stoves are needed to reduce pollution.

Such development, while appreciable, will still give us a staggering number of people who will continue to be without access to clean fuels or clean cooking facilities.

The Middle East fairs well in this respect as only 19 million were said to be without access to electricity in 2011 and none by 2030 because these countries have invested so much in generation and distribution.

But why is progress, as good as it is, so much less than desired? One reason is that the investment is not sufficient where nearly “$1 trillion would be required to achieve universal energy access by 2030, an average of $49 billion per year (from 2011 to 2030)” while current investment is 20 per cent of what is needed according to 2009 estimates.

The development banks, especially the World Bank, are not doing enough as they concentrate on big projects and higher rates of returns. It may be necessary to create a separate institution mandated only with investment in this sector and at the same time governments must make the eradication of energy poverty a priority.

The argument whether to rely on integrated national grids or on localised or a ‘mini-grid’ solution should be settled and adaptation of site specific solutions must be sought. An opportunity for renewable energy sources must be given, especially in remote areas in order to achieve optimum results and make use of the technical advances that have become evident now.

As for oil and gas producing countries, they fare well in energy provision, though in Nigeria and Angola more than half the population lives without access to electricity. International oil companies who operate in the producing countries must be made to participate in the provision of energy not only for their operations but to the local community to a certain extent.

International aid organisations must do more and in this respect Opec’s sister organisation — the Opec Fund for International Development — is very active in helping developing countries in this regard. It is a shame when someone in a rich country can keep saying that “my fridge uses nine times more electricity than the average Ethiopian citizen”.

Credit: The writer is former head of the Energy Studies Department at the Opec Secretariat in Vienna.