EuroFSA supports Fire Safety and energy poverty project

This project, a studentship at the University of Manchester, lead by professor Stefan Bouzarovski, aims to investigate the relationships between domestic fire safety and energy poverty. It starts from the premise that households who struggle to afford needed energy services in the home are also disproportionately exposed to fire risks, due to the poor quality of their housing and electricity installations, as well as the higher prevalence of unsafe energy consumption practices.

In terms of research impacts, the studentship is expected to lead to novel insights into the drivers and impacts of the cost-of-living crisis on well-being and housing, as well as the relationships between energy infrastructures and climate change more broadly (due to the overheating of housing during hot weather in particular). It opens several innovative strands of scientific and policy enquiry by connecting measures to mitigate and confront fire risks in housing and cities, on the one hand, with wider socio-environmental vulnerabilities arising from multiple forms of precarisation, austerity and systemic disadvantage, on the other. By exposing a ‘silent killer’, the studentship can lead to tangible improvements in health and safety outcomes for low-income and disadvantaged households in particular.

The project involves working with three organisations:
1. Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service (MFRS)
2. Antwerp Regional Fire Service
3. European Fire Safety Alliance

EuroFSA, in corporation with the Netherlands Institute for Public Safety (NIPV), supports the project, in terms of disseminating and upscaling the findings to European and global policy-makers and scientists alike.