By the end of 2025, Portugal will have 50 places to fight energy poverty

By the end of next year, Portugal will have 50 Civic Energy Space sites spread across the country to support people in the energy sector, and is due to start this year with five pilot projects.

The forecast was put forward this Friday by Nelson Lage, President of the Energy Agency (ADENE), at a meeting dedicated to the National Long-Term Strategy for the Fight against Energy Poverty (ELPPE) for 2023-2050, recently published.

This goal was also emphasized by the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Ana Fontoura Gouveia, who spoke at the opening of the initiative.

According to Nelson Lage, these spaces, which are one of the main stages of this year’s Strategy, are designed to support citizens and will be located across the country, focusing not only on energy, but also on energy sustainability.

This is a space for information, as well as for technical support, consultations, home assessments for energy efficiency, investment proposals for energy efficiency improvements, as well as data collection and training activities, the same source explained.

The model should be studied in the first quarters of this year, with five projects starting in the last quarter and implementation starting next year, he said.

ELPPE, published last week in Diário da República, predicts that energy poverty will be eliminated by 2050, with the assumption that by that time only 1% of people will not be able to adequately heat their homes.

Answering Lusa’s question about how this goal will be achieved, Ana Fontoura Gouveia spoke about existing measures, but emphasized that the country is accumulating knowledge in the fight against energy poverty.

As an example, he cited the automatic provision of support for social energy tariffs or the change in the form of efficiency vouchers, the first stage of which did not go as planned.

“The first measure did not live up to expectations because we were unable to reach the target audience, and yet we managed to support 9,600 vulnerable families. We have now developed a new program that ensures that people living in rented houses are also eligible, we have increased the volume of support we have ensured that beneficiaries of minimum benefits are also eligible, and through this we are building knowledge that will allow us to continue to implement this policy, reaching more and more people,” he said.

The official also calls for the creation of a National Observatory on Energy Poverty, as envisioned in the ELPPE, which would provide information through local indicators “for more targeted decisions” and develop plans and actions to achieve the goals.

Everything, he added, is about working with local authorities and associations so that vulnerable families can be reached and supported.

The Secretary of State, at a meeting held at the Alcántara library, recalled that one of the main areas of the eradication of energy poverty is environmental and energy sustainability of housing, which means adequately heated houses without moisture penetration and moisture intrusion.

“Today thousands of families have thermal comfort, the program to support more sustainable buildings has already reached 70 thousand families, and a new warning is being issued,” he said.

In the Vale Eficiency program (with an allocation of 130 million euros for 2021-25), support has tripled, the person in charge also recalled, noting that the social energy tariff now reaches 700 thousand families.

At a meeting this Friday, the Director General of the Energy and Geology Directorate, Jerónimo Cunha, said that the Observatory will begin mapping energy poverty this year.

Environment Minister Duarte Cordeiro closed the session by saying that energy poverty targets need to be seen as a “national plan”, deeming it important that support programs are maintained every year and that they achieve better results. and more people.