An Overview of Renewable Energy Technologies in the Eastern Cape Province in South Africa and the Rural Households’ Energy Poverty Coping Strategies

Abstract

Despite technological innovation and vast renewable energy sources in rural areas, a significant number of rural households are living in energy poverty, and there is a pressing need to come up with strategies to mitigate this. This paper presents an overview of the energy sources in the Eastern Cape Province, the status of renewable energy technologies and the household energy poverty coping strategies in rural areas. The analysis of this study is based on conducted studies on renewable technologies in the Eastern Cape. This paper aims to help to provide a deeper understanding in the selection of the most appropriate renewable energy technologies suited to rural households’ energy needs and to fill the knowledge gap existing in renewable energy technologies to make it easier to map a way forward into the households’ energy poverty coping strategies in the Eastern Cape.