ABSTRACT
The chapter illustrates the experiences, challenges, and practices in the households of energy-vulnerable women in North Macedonia and Austria, based on their lived experience. We inspect these issues in two European countries with different path dependencies co-shaping energy poverty but similar gender equality indicators. The chapter applies energy justice to energy poverty through a gender lens. We argue that energy-vulnerable women in Austria and North Macedonia experience multiple inequalities at the household level, reflected in gendered coping strategies and socio-cultural practices. These gendered strategies and practices are informed by the disadvantaged socio-economic position and limited power experienced by the majority of women and are magnified by other vulnerabilities such as health, age, and ethnicity. Female energy poverty at the household level only mirrors the existing gender inequalities in society. Women experience energy poverty due to low incomes, the physical burden of using outdated but affordable energy carriers, and their emotional and cognitive caretaker or caregiver's role in the family. Women in energy poverty face limitations and dependence when it comes to making decisions about managing energy in their homes. The respondents are exposed to adverse health impacts as a result of living in energy poverty. If they are old, ill, minority, or migrant, energy-poor women's experiences of energy poverty are multiplied. The gendered coping strategies often involve self-restriction and substandard satisfaction of basic needs, but may not always be recognised as material deprivation by women and are thus rendered invisible. However, these strategies help women persist through their circumstances while performing gendered household tasks and caring for the family. To achieve a socially just energy transition, there is a need to recognise the female face of energy poverty.
