Pedro Palma

• Doctor of Engineering
• Researcher at Universidade NOVA de Lisboa

Portugal and Spain share a historical and territorial bond and a severe challenge to alleviate energy poverty, a complex issue affecting millions of people. Reducing this social scourge is a major concern for both governments, which have published national energy poverty strategies in recent years. This paper critically explores the Iberian policy...

This paper aims to critically analyse and compare the definition and measurement of energy poverty reflected in the national policy strategies in Portugal and Spain and propose recommendations for their enhancement. The analysis is supported by a systematic literature review of indicators in the Iberian context. Results highlight that both definiti...

This article examines the multidimensional problem of energy poverty, focusing on its connections to climate change and its manifestation at rural and urban scales across selected European countries and Israel. The study examined 31 locations in eight countries with diverse geographical and economic backgrounds: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Greece, Nort...

Hard-to-reach (HTR) energy users encompass individuals who are physically difficult to reach, underserved, or challenging to engage and motivate in demand-side energy programmes. Given a mix of societal challenges (e.g. inequity, energy poverty, decarbonisation, the COVID-19 pandemic), HTR energy users are receiving increasing attention. However, t...

Climate change mitigation, the economy’s decarbonisation, and energy poverty reduction are major challenges globally and for the European Union. However, competing agendas might create trade-off situations that hinder the achievement of these goals. Energy efficiency promotion in the residential sector, through the replacement of space heating and...

This report aims to investigate, identify and analyse the variety of data sources, datasets, and methods used in the literature for assessing energy poverty at greater spatial resolution for specific contexts, territories, and populations. Ultimately, the goal is to collect helpful information and knowledge, and channel it in the direction of local...

The building sector is one of the critical pieces for the sustainable transformation in Europe. This study assesses the cost-effectiveness of renovation measures for reducing the Portuguese dwelling stock’s space heating and cooling energy needs at national and regional levels. Three different scenarios with varying renovation levels were developed...

The Energy Poverty Advisory Hub has collected more than 200 inspirational cases during a research period that took place in 2021. The EPAH ATLAS is an online interactive database that allows visitors to discover local and international projects as well as measures addressing energy poverty across the world. Visitors can explore the interactive map,...

Raising concerns about the effectiveness of the energy poverty policy actions in Poland, such as Clean Air and Stop Smog, brings forward the need to apply different strategies to identify the energy poor. More than 13.7% of Polish households were energy poor in 2018 according to the ability-to-keep-home-warm indicator. This study proposes enhancing...

The Positive Energy District (PED) concept has been pointed out as key for cities' energy system transformation toward carbon neutrality. The PED may be defined as an energy-efficient and flexible urban area with net-zero energy import and greenhouse gas emissions, aiming toward annual local surplus of renewable energy. Most of the studies and prac...

The intensity and duration of hot weather and the number of extreme weather events, such as heatwaves, are increasing, leading to a growing need for space cooling energy demand. Together with the building stock’s low energy performance, this phenomenon may also increase households’ energy consumption. On the other hand, the low level of ownership o...

Main topic submission: Energy-efficient and sustainable buildings Keywords: Heritage renovation; Energy Efficiency; Financing; Regulation; Online one-stop-shop

The UK has an extensive research base in the field of energy poverty, to the extent that other countries have based their policy approaches on the UK model. Despite this, there is no common method for measuring this condition across the UK. Additionally, sustaining meaningful reductions in UK energy poverty remains a challenge. While significant re...

*** Resumen *** _ En este trabajo se propone una recopilación de experiencias realizadas en la península ibérica desarrolladas con el objetivo de identificar áreas en riesgo de pobreza energética. Para ello se muestran algunos indicadores desarrollados en Portugal para la escala nacional en comparación con otros desarrollados en España para la esc...

WG2 considers the operationalisation of a multi-scalar, COST-wide framework on energy poverty. In the first of a series of policy briefs, we provide an overview of what is currently known about energy poverty in COST countries, the range of indicators available, and ways to improve data provision. This brief focuses on the pan-European level. Futur...

The reduction of energy consumption and the increase in energy efficiency is currently an important cornerstone of EU policy. Energy performance certificates (EPCs) were implemented as one of the tools to promote this agenda, and are used for the energy performance assessment of buildings. In this study, the characteristics of the Portuguese dwelli...

Energy poverty seriously affects living conditions and health. In spite of its mild climate, Portugal has been pointed out as one of the most vulnerable countries in the European Union. Due to the multidimensionality of energy poverty, attention needs to be paid to specific factors contributing to it in different contexts. This paper contributes to...

h i g h l i g h t s • High spatial scale multi-faceted method for EP regional vulnerability assessment. • Buildings energy performance gaps and socioeconomic variables are combined. • Tool for hotspots identification for local action and comparative analysis. • Both space heating and cooling problems are highlighted for a Southern EU country. a b s...

With the purpose of meeting the set targets for 2020, the EU has steered its policy towards the reduction of building’s energy consumption, which nowadays represents 40% of the EU total energy consumption, mainly through energy efficiency (EE) improvement, as stated in the EU Directive 2010/31. Nevertheless, residential sector cannot disregard the...