Will Plans to Ease Energy Poverty Go Up in Smoke? Assessing the Hungarian NECP through the Lens of Solid Fuel Users’ Vulnerabilities

• Published in: Sustainability 2021-12, Vol.13 (23), p.13047
• Main Authors: Bajomi, Anna Zsofia, Feldmár, Nóra, Tirado-Herrero, Sergio
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Air pollution; Clean energy; Clean technology; Climate change; Energy efficiency; Energy policy; Energy poverty; Energy prices; Heating; Households; Housing; Indoor air quality; Low income groups; Market positioning; Poverty; Price cuts; Renewable resources; Residential energy; Society; Solid fuels; Sustainability
• ISSN: 2071-1050; 2071-1050
• DOI: 10.3390/su132313047

Hungary has one of the highest incidences of energy poverty in the European Union, and a high share of Hungarian low-income households rely on solid fuels. This paper first maps the energy vulnerabilities of Hungarian solid fuel users using six energy vulnerability factors. The mapping underlines that solid fuel users are more exposed to energy vulnerability than average households. This is followed by an analysis of energy-poverty-related objectives and measures outlined in the Hungarian National Energy and Climate Plan (NECP), a key policy document of the green energy transition. The paper outlines that the NECP fails to comply with the requirement of setting energy poverty alleviation objectives. Furthermore, the outlined energy-poverty-related policies and measures fail to provide systematic solutions to energy-poverty drivers, especially those solid fuel users’ vulnerabilities. Hungary’s general antiegalitarian policy environment and the weak design of energy poverty measures in the NECP suggest severe deficiency regarding a just energy transition guarantee. A just energy transition in Hungary is therefore endangered by the fact that EU energy poverty alleviation requirements fall under soft-law coordination mechanisms that make such requirements hardly enforceable in a member state with an antipoor policy bias that is reluctant to tackle energy poverty.