All of the ‘Energy Policies Above Will Help Reduce Energy Poverty Here and Abroad – Is It Good?
Via Derrick Hollie & Vijay Jayaraj
Many Americans have felt the sting of inflation as it climbed to 8.5% – the highest level in more than 40 years. This has increased the cost of housing, heating, food and everyday expenses – leaving many people living on paychecks while others look for creative ways to cut costs anywhere. they can.
Given the current crisis, solutions to combat energy poverty should be at the forefront of every conversation and news. However, it is ignored.
Energy poverty can be found in all lack conditions Adequate, affordable, reliable, quality, safe and environmentally sound energy services to support development.
According to what’s most recent result According to the recently published U.S. Energy Information Administration’s Residential Energy Consumption Survey (RECS), about one-fifth of households reported reducing or forgoing basic needs such as food. and drugs to pay energy bills and nearly a third of US households – 31% – say they are facing a challenge in paying their energy bills or maintaining heating and cooling systems. full cooler in their home.
Despite these conditions, energy poverty is not officially recognized as a government concern. This limits an effective response from local and federal governments.
The average American household’s experience of energy poverty differs from that of other countries. In these countries, one can own a heater, a refrigerator or a television. But they are not usable because their government cannot provide adequate access to energy or worse, does not have access to energy due to lack of infrastructure. In the case of “sustainable development” goal, the United Nations reports that 789 million people – mainly in sub-Saharan Africa – are living without access to electricity and hundreds of millions more have only very limited or unreliable access. Under this current trajectoryThe United Nations warns that there will still be 650 million people without electricity by 2030.
Energy poverty is detrimental. Nearly three billion people depend on wood, coal, charcoal or animal waste for cooking and heating. That’s about 38% of the world’s total population without gas or electricity for their cooking needs. UN World Health Organization report that about 2.6 billion people cook using polluting open fires or simple stoves fueled by kerosene and biomass (wood, animal manure and crop waste). This causes four million premature deaths from illness due to household air pollution caused by inefficient cooking. In addition, non-communicable diseases including stroke, ischemic heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and lung cancer are more common. Nearly half of pneumonia deaths in children under the age of 5 are due to particulate matter (soot) inhaled from household air pollution.
Using Liquefied Petroleum Gas (Methane, Propane and Butane) can help overcome energy poverty. In most developed countries, the cooking of food is a trivial matter. People have electricity or gas to power their stoves. In developing parts of the world and poor countries, people don’t.
It is important to address the demand for oil and gas, not less. Any attempt to complicate global oil and gas demand will ensure a wider spread of disease and even death among the world’s least privileged.
The continued evolution of hydrocarbons is Prerequisites for the poor. Without them, there would be no cooking fuel for billions of people. Even a little power outage results in power outages for more than a billion people every day.
It won’t make sense for governments to switch to intermittent renewables like wind and solar because of climate change, abandoning the main sources of oil and natural gas that we still need. There is no backup solution other than fossil fuels and hydrocarbons to handle real-time demand during peak hours.
A truly fair energy evolution requires more energy, from all sources – not less. Even advanced economies like the UK and Germany cannot meet their electricity demand when renewables fail. Why do developing countries have better fares?
The clear call from the world’s poor is not climate SOS. Rather, the world is in dire need of economic growth that can only be fostered through the widespread use of fossil fuels and hydrocarbons.
Derrick Hollie is President of Reaching America, an educational organization he developed to address complex social issues affecting vulnerable populations, and is a member of a black leadership network. Project 21.
Vijay Jayaraj is a research associate at CO2 Alliance and holds a Master of Environmental Science from the University of East Anglia, UK.
This comment is the first Published at Real Clear Energy May 27, 2022
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