Modeling energy consumption to measure energy poverty in households in Buenos Aires (Argentina), 2017-2018

Abstract

Energy poverty is a complex,multidimensional problem that affectspeople’s quality of life. Its study has becomean important pillar of the public policyagenda and the literature in Latin America.Using the 10% indicator, this paper aimed tomodel the energy consumption ofhouseholds in Argentina to estimate theenergy expenditure of each and thusdetermine which households are in a situationof energy poverty. For the empirical analysisThe authors used the 2017–2018 NationalHousehold Expenditure Survey of Argentina,and urban households in the interior of theprovince of Buenos Aires were selected as acase study. After characterizing the mainenergy consumption habits of the sample,energy poverty was assessed. The analysisshows that for the study period (2017–2018),a significant number of households sufferedfrom energy poverty; that is, they spent morethan 10% of their income on energyexpenditures. The findings indicate that theDemand Model is consistent, as the degree ofadjustment is 0.1% in the demand forelectricity and natural gas and 0.3% in thedemand for liquefied petroleum gas. Inaddition, 462,143 households (28.3% of thesample analyzed) in the interior of theprovince of Buenos Aires experienced energydeprivation when considering the 10%indicator. On the other hand, by means of the2M indicator, the results show that 518,686households were in energy poverty (31.8% ofthe sample analyzed).