Social Impacts of Energy Conservation

Discusses the potential social implications of energy conservation measures, particularly with reference to equity and distributional impacts and to the voluntariness dimension. It is argued that conservation concerns need not conflict with interests of poor people. Rather, equity impacts are dependent on the specific characteristics and conditions of energy conservation measures. There are no typical voluntary and mandatory categories of energy saving measures, but all instruments could vary in the associated degree of voluntariness. (16 ref)