Energy poverty across Europe: Problematisation and policy measures through the lens of energy justice

In addition to technological challenges, the energy transition involves societal, political, and economic rearrangements. These rearrangements may exacerbate existing inequalities and injustices or generate new ones. To shed light on how just energy transitions are currently envisioned, this article assesses which injustices are recognised and addressed in four National Energy and Climate Plans (NECP) mandated by the European Union. The plans of Austria, Denmark, Poland and Italy are compared via qualitative content analysis. The articles focuses on how countries problematise and plan to address energy poverty, which is conceptualised as energy injustice, adopting an energy justice perspective. The analysis shows that all plans are limited in their appreciation of energy poverty along the three energy justice tenets discussed in the literature (recognition, distribution, procedural justice). All plans disregard gender, and other vulnerabilities to energy poverty and spatial injustices are rarely mentioned. The Italian plan appears the most detailed in problematising energy poverty, while Denmark provides the least detail on the issue, assigning energy poverty to social policy, which is considered separately from the NECP. All countries identify energy-efficient buildings as a promising intervention area, but measures targeting the specific financial obstacles faced by people in energy poverty still need to be clarified. Generally, a wider acknowledgement of structural injustices associated with energy poverty is needed to integrate social and energy goals and reach a “justice-aware” energy policy.