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When will world leaders reimagine their approach to improving the prospects of developing nations in health, employment, nutrition, and access to affordable and clean energy? Those were ambitious goals set by world leaders in 2015, at a time in which there were only 38 million hungry people in the world. Optimism in the global community about ending poverty and addressing climate change was pervasive then, and, why not? Two decades worth of poverty reductions and geopolitical cooperation inspired the United Nations to rally countries around a set of sustainable development goals on human and planetary well-being.
Yet, today, about 733 million people around the world are facing hunger. Families don’t foresee how they can illuminate and heat their homes, keep their vehicle fueled, and cook meals. The Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative has highlighted the correlation between a lack of electricity access and education, poor health, and malnourishment. It is an important story to share how poverty is persistent across the globe — and how electrifying the world could produce the largest human development gains since the 1990s.
Access to clean energy resources is indispensable for human well-being. Instead of treating electrification as one of many positive goals to move us toward decarbonization, it’s time to see it is essential to all of them, argues Rajiv Shah, president of the Rockefeller Foundation, in a New York Times editorial. Trying to make modest improvements on all issues is not working, as it is only “diffusing already thin resources.”
Now, there’s a new dimension to the power of renewables, according to Shah: they have real potential to impact and alleviate energy poverty across the globe.
“In today’s digital world, nothing matters more to individual well-being than energy: Access to electricity determines fundamental aspects of individuals’ lives, like whether they are healthy or have a job. And that means the world needs to focus investment and effort on getting reliable, clean electricity to the nearly 700 million people who don’t have any — and the 3.1 billion more who don’t have enough.”
The global community set its 2015 goals under particular geopolitical, economic, and technological circumstances that have changed. “By focusing on getting electricity to everyone,” Shah describes, “we can make the world more secure and stable and perhaps even more optimistic once again.”
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Energy plays an increasingly important role in today’s world. Sufficient energy is the prerequisite for residents to meet basic safety and health needs, and families burdened by energy poverty have to deal with high energy expense and low energy efficiency. It’s important to understand that energy poverty does not only occur in rural areas with poor infrastructure — it also takes place in urban low-income households across the world. Because large numbers of people continue to rely on archaic solid fuel sources such as firewood and coal for cooking and heating, or be burdened with heavy debt for purchasing modern energy services, energy poverty has become pervasive.
Areas of Energy Poverty Concern
Four core areas work in tandem with clean energy: energy poverty, health strength, career advancement, and social well-being. A comprehensive understanding of these impacts should be the top priority in energy poverty governance.
Clean energy not only directly alleviates global energy poverty — it inhibits energy poverty by improving energy efficiency. Noting that “populism has become a potent ideology, curtailing free trade, international agreements, and more,” Shah states that current aid levels are insufficient to achieve all of these goals. Partially, that’s because competition among China, Russia, and the US and its allies has stymied international organizations and action.
Lending from the private sector to these energy impoverished countries has also fallen while interest rates on existing debt have increased — to the point that $50 billion will be needed this year to pay interest on debts. High energy prices are straining livelihoods at a moment when coups, migration, and unrest are destabilizing regions.
But Shah, who was the administrator of the US Agency for International Development from 2009 to 2015, explains that, rather than losing hope, “technological advances have opened another path. Improved solar panels, batteries, and other breakthroughs now make it far easier to provide reliable, clean electrification to everyone.” Because the countries where energy access is lowest are projected to produce as much as 75% of greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, “connecting people there to clean energy can help prevent climate catastrophe for us all,” Shah states.
How Clean Energy Reduces Poverty and Brings about Healthier Lives
How prominent has renewable energy become in developing countries?
The International Renewable Energy Agency (IREA) outlines that, despite improvements across indicators — such as energy access, energy efficiency, renewable energy adoption and international cooperation — the current pace of progress falls short of that required to achieve the SDG targets by 2030.
The IREA’s 2024 report finds that 91% of the global population had access to electricity in 2022, leaving 685 million people still without access — 10 million people more than in 2021. Similarly, while 74% of the world’s population had access to clean cooking technologies in 2022, 2.1 billion people still relied on polluting fuels, with only modest progress expected by 2030.
Renewables accounted for 18.7% of total final energy consumption worldwide in 2021, barely higher than the 16.7% in 2015. The world is not on course to double energy efficiency by 2030, having improved by only 0.8% in 2021.
Studies have shown that increased consumption of renewable energy can help accelerate global energy conservation and emissions reduction. Electrification is about more than progress for individuals; it makes the world safer and more secure.
But the world needs to put more attention and resources into this much-needed energy transition to ensure it reaches everyone. Some institutions are doing just that. The World Bank and the African Development Bank, in partnership with the Rockefeller Foundation, and others, have committed $30 billion to connect 300 million Africans to electricity by 2030, according to Shah.
“With this kind of capital, governments and companies together will be able to accelerate projects in challenging environments. Beyond lighting homes, the initiative could also power health care facilities that serve up to 90 million people, avoid as many as 65 megatons of carbon dioxide, allow two million to three million people to improve their education and create millions of jobs, according to an early analysis by Sustainable Energy for All, an international organization that works on electricity access.”
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