This is project is funded by FPRN as part of the EPEC programme for early career 2020-21 round.
Community energy drives a democratic approach in the energy transition. Enabling local citizens to participate, community energy provides a voice and choice to all energy consumers. Their membership data, however, often suggests a different picture. Especially vulnerable and energy-poor households do not participate. In consequence, the most vulnerable miss out on energy communities’ benefits. The reasons for their exclusion – although speculated about – remain widely unknown. This project sets out to investigate the perspective of the energy poor. How do they perceive energy communities and their participation in them? We carry out interviews and an online experiment to investigate energy poverty’s impact on the involvement in community energy initiatives.
‘Currently the voices of the energy poor are unheard in community energy research. By means of the grant we will change that.’
Florian Hanke 2022
Florian provides an overview of the research including rationale, methodology and implications.