Energy Efficiency Optimum Strategies to Promote Low Carbon Development in West Africa and Energy Justice for Women Living in Rural Areas

The International Development Research Centre (IDRC) funds research in developing countries to promote growth, reduce poverty, and drive large-scale positive change. Econoler has received such funds to lead, in collaboration with African scholars, a research project to discover how and which EE policy decisions help deliver energy justice for women in rural areas of Sub-Saharan African (SSA). Specifically, energy poverty is embedded into this project as a normative framework defined by energy justice (a recent concept in literature, which includes, among other principles, equity, sustainability and accountability). Another objective of this project is to explore how implementing EE measures can benefit both climate change adaptation and mitigation efforts and, therefore, how it can help achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

This research project was aimed at determining how EE policy can improve the socio-economic and environmental conditions of women in SSA countries (Benin, Senegal and Togo). It was implemented under an interdisciplinary approach combining scholars from the fields of engineering, sociology, economy, gender, and health. Under the mandate, Econoler is carrying out the following tasks:

• Analyze the concept of energy justice through scientific literature and define the normative (both epistemological and ethical) framework using the capability approach;
• Analyze the socio-economic and cultural contexts of each target country and how they affect the gender situation in energy services;
• Conduct a quantitative survey of 2,200 households in the three SSA countries to collect sex-disaggregated data on energy needs, energy consumption and energy-related opportunities in rural areas. The survey will also serve to define the household decision-making process;
• Conduct qualitative analysis through interviews and focus group discussions complement the survey;
• Benchmark energy policy tailored to improving energy justice based on a ex post analysis of both quantitative and qualitative data;
• Prepare 14 peer-reviewed scientific articles to present the findings in close collaboration with scholars and students from local partner universities.

This project was carried out in close collaboration with local partners, stakeholders and scholars. Energy research and the field itself benefited from this project through the formulation of new conceptual and empirical knowledge, while the SSA region obtained information and know-how to improve the status of energy justice, thus improving the socio-economic situation especially of the most vulnerable groups.