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There are currently 2.8 billion people on earth who live on less than $2 a day, an amount the World Bank uses to measure poverty1. Poverty refers not only to a lack of wealth, but also to the inability to fulfill basic human needs. On the other end of the spectrum, the world's 225 wealthiest people have a combined income of $1 trillion 2! These statistics illustrate the large disprepancy between the "haves" and "the have-nots". Unfortunately, the gap arguably gets bigger by the day. How can we change this trend? What would be an effective approach to take on this overwhelming but quintessential problem?
The social and economic issues associated with development from poverty, such as education, health care, clean water, child mortality, and wealth are all interconnected. These are being addressed from various approaches and each warrants sustained attention. A fundamental component necessary for progress in all these fields is access to modern energy. Energy consumption is a prerequisite to development and poverty alleviation which warrants a careful examination of the most effective ways to increase it's accessibility to those who need it the most- those who live in poverty.
"To implement the goal accepted by the international community to halve the proportion of people living on less than US$ 1 per day by 2015, access to affordable energy services is a prerequisite." 3
Take a look at the world's distribution of energy.
You'll
notice the strong correlation between the world's
distribution of energy consumption and wealth.
This is not a coincidence. Wealth and energy consumption
increase together with positive feedback. The
World Bank has also shown a direct correlation
between energy consumption and quality of life,
as measured by the Human Development Index, which
takes into account educational achievement, life
expectancy, and income. This is because practically
every feature of development requires energy consumption
and is improved with access to modern energy:
health care, education, and income growth.
The research that follows will take a deeper
look into how a lack of access to modern energy
affects one's life (see
Terese) and identify some of the key problems
from the supply side (see
Barriers). The Best
Practices section describes certain aspects
and mechanisms that can accelerate the process,
while the various case
studies illustrate how the specific needs
in a certain context dictate the method of obtaining
access to modern energy.. This will hopefully
provide a good overview of the main issues and
problems with a lack of energy and make clear
the relevance of this issue.
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