Conceptualizing a "double energy vulnerability" for energy and transport poverty: reflections from a French context

Keywords: Energy poverty, energy vulnerability, transport poverty, energy justice
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Monday
Session Start / End Time: 2/28/2022 08:00 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/28/2022 09:20 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 42

Abstract

The paper addresses the articulations between domestic and transport energy poverty. The academic interest for these "double vulnerability" conditions is recent. It is led by both the need to conceptualize and evaluate the cumulative impacts of rising energy prices on both domestic energy consumption and mobility practices, and by the need to design policies encompassing the articulation of both types of vulnerabilities in urban planning.
The paper is part of a research project designed in the wake of the “gilets jaunes” (Yellow vests) movement in France, which saw car-dependent households protest against the rise of the carbon taxes on fuel. This vast protest movement highlighted the challenges of designing just low-carbon policies in a largely car-dependent national landscape, where mobility inequalities are a highly sensitive issue. Drawing from the energy vulnerability framework and a rich French literature and reflexion on indicators design, the paper specifically offers a conceptualisation of a "double vulnerability" affecting peri-urban and rural households in their daily domestic energy consumption and mobility practices. It highlights the challenges of measuring the intersections between both conditions, and presents the quanti-qualitative research design applied in the South West of France, where the Gilets Jaunes movement has attracted large numbers of car-dependent households. Furthermore, the paper grounds these results in a study of the shift induced by both climate change and "gilets jaunes" protests in the national policies targeting mobilities and domestic energy poverty.