Events

WISE project – Women for Solidarity in Energy workshop

WISE project and OTKA research: Collective for Women for Solidarity in Energy and the energy crisis in Hungary 

The HUN-REN Centre for Social Sciences is organizing the WISE project – Women for Solidarity in Energy workshop and the OTKA research event "Hungary in the energy crisis: from energy poverty to energy scarcity".

Date: 17 October 2024, Thursday 14:00–17:00

Location: 1097 Budapest, Tóth Kálmán u. 4., room K.0.13

The HUN-REN Centre for Social Sciences is a consortium member of the Women for Solidarity in Energy (WISE project), which is part of the CERV program. The project involves six other countries; Bulgaria, Croatia, France, Greece, Italy, and the Netherlands, and is led by Act4 based in France.

WISE aims to raise awareness of energy inequality, increase the knowledge of low-income single women, single mothers, and retired women on the topic, and empower them to participate in the development of policies to address current energy inequality. WISE develops and disseminates content on energy policy, energy efficiency, and fundamental rights related to energy consumption. A parallel OTKA research project is looking at the Hungarian response to the energy crisis from 2021-2022 onwards in terms of lowering the utility cap and reducing the energy bill. The research focuses on the lived experiences of public and commercial sector workers who have experienced temperatures that are too cold or too hot at work.

Prolonged exposure to crises, COVID-19, the climate crisis, and the energy crisis due to rising prices since 2021-2022, are affecting access to energy services for individuals. Not all individuals are equally resilient to crises. Women are more vulnerable to energy and transport poverty, partly due to their lower average income, with negative health consequences and social exclusion ( Murauskaite-Bull, I., Feenstra, M., Creusen, A., Koukoufikis, G., Della, V. N., Shortall, R., & Stojilovska, A. (2024). Gender and Energy: The effects of the energy transition on women. JRC Publications Repository. https://doi.org/10.2760/860118). Reducing social inequalities is essential to ensure a just energy transition.

In Hungary, the utility program has already been criticized for not supporting the most vulnerable, such as those who use firewood, and the changes in this program during the energy crisis have increased energy poverty. Not only households but also the public and private sectors are affected, with large users such as universities and hospitals having to cut heating and cooling. Record heat waves in the summer of 2024 have drawn attention to summer energy poverty. The increase in utility prices coupled with the rise in rents will exacerbate the housing crisis in Hungary.                 

Energy poverty puts certain groups of women at increased risk: women living in rural areas, especially small towns, retired women, Roma women, migrant women, and single mothers, as they are less resilient to the energy crisis and have fewer opportunities to actively participate in the energy transition.

The workshop aims to bring together actors working on energy poverty, gender, migration, and social and environmental inequalities in Hungary to share and discuss the issues of women's energy poverty in Hungary.

The workshop will consist of two parts: the first part will introduce the WISE project and explain how participants can join the project. The second part aims to gather participants' views and experiences on current energy issues facing women in Hungary, such as the utility program reduction, the 2024 summer heatwave, and the housing crisis, and to discuss good practices and policy gaps. 

The workshop will bring together experts from different professional backgrounds to discuss the issues of energy poverty and the energy crisis in Hungary from different perspectives.

The project is funded by the European Union through the CERV program, under the project 101147937, co-funded by the European Climate Change Foundation and Focus Slovenia, and by the National Research, Development and Innovation Office under the project PD_23 OTKA 145881.

The workshop is organized by:

 Ana Stojilovska, PhD Research Fellow, HUN-REN Centre for Social Sciences ana.stojilovska@tk.hu  

Sára Szabó, Project Assistant, HUN-REN Centre for Social Sciences sara.szabo@tk.hu