VIRTUAL Manchester Livable Cities
Abstract
A just energy transition is essential to address the current social and climate crisis, as reflected in Sustainable Development Goal 7 of the 2030 Agenda. Specifically, energy poverty poses a significant challenge, as it manifests itself unevenly across different regions and is also linked to factors such as gender and age. This study analyzes the feminization of energy poverty in Spanish urban environments, using Seville as a pilot case. Sociodemographic variables, such as female-headed households, age, migration, and energy load, are combined with housing construction and energy efficiency characteristics. The results show that income level is intertwined with gender, creating an unequal spatial distribution of energy vulnerability in urban areas. In particular, energy-inefficient households headed by women exhibit high vulnerability, with high household energy burden scores. Furthermore, the analysis identifies that the energy and gender indicators examined yield notably high values in the central districts of Seville. The proposed methodology thus allows for linking different SDG targets. It demonstrates how progress towards a more just and sustainable society requires intersectoral studies and actions that connect various spheres of impact. It is hoped that the methodology and results presented will be replicated in other cities in Spain and that, in the future, they will serve as a basis for developing rehabilitation and energy transition policies that integrate criteria of social justice and a gender perspective.
Dr. Susana Clavijo Núñez is an Energy Engineer and holds a PhD in Architecture from the University of Seville. She is a researcher affiliated with the Department of Agricultural and Environmental Engineering at the University of La Laguna (Spain). Her research focuses on regional-level climate change studies, as well as on energy poverty from a just transition perspective, incorporating gender, citizen participation, and equity considerations. She has participated as a researcher in European Horizon 2020 projects, as well as in various international development cooperation projects.