Book

This book provides an analysis about the depth link between two of today’s biggest global challenges: a rapidly ageing population and energy consumption. To understand how this change in the EU's population structure affects energy consumption in the residential sector, two approaches are provided: (i) Electricity consumption per capita and (ii) Energy consumption per household. The 1st approach uses electricity consumption efficiency of an ageing population while the 2nd approach is based on the consumption of energy per household. In the first approach the countries are ranked by levels of efficiency through the employment of the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) method and defines the efficiency determinants for electricity consumption per capita through the employment of the Fractional Regression Method (FRM). It proposes policy recommendations considering the best performers (benchmarking) and identifies the drivers that positively and negatively impulse efficiency. The 2nd approach is based on the consumption of energy per household and evaluate the effect of an ageing population on energy use per household by focusing on factors directly linked to elderly households through the employment of the Panel Corrected Standard Errors (PCSEs) Model. It also determines the energy poverty drivers related to an ageing population that influence the efficiency levels of the energy use per household, through the employment of the Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) method. This research provides new insights by comparing the two approaches provided and identifies the challenges and opportunities that arise from both analyses - per capita and per household. This book suggests some recommendations that could represent global solutions for the member states of the EU, and which could reduce the impact of the social changes verified in the population structure, namely an ageing population, has on the energy use in the residential sector.