19/2/24, 15:37 Interpreting the energy choices and environmental satisfaction determinants in low-income housing typologies: Cases from

Cases from slum…

Cities
Volume 143, December 2023, 104576

Interpreting the energy choices and environmental satisfaction

determinants in low-income housing typologies: Cases from slums
and slum rehabilitation housing of Mumbai, India
Ahana Sarkar a , Arnab Jana b

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https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2023.104576
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Highlights

• Built-environment and occupant behaviour impact energy choices.

• Constrained condition affects environmental satisfaction in low-income

communities.

• Change in built environment and behaviour impacts energy consumptions

• Empirical evidences to ascertain differences among slums and mass housing

• Need for design guidelines for low-income housing to improve satisfaction.

Abstract

This study explores the impact of built-environment characteristics and occupant behaviour on appliance ownership, energy
consumption, and environmental satisfaction in low-income settlements. A shift in the built-environment setting significantly impacts
energy choices, appliance purchase decisions, appliance characteristics, and related occupant behaviour and household practices. This
study performs a comparative analysis of the horizontal slums and vertical tenements of slum rehabilitation housing (SRH) in Mumbai by
quantitatively investigating the difference in built-environment settings from horizontality to verticality on energy decisions. A
Computer-based Personal Interview was conducted among 643 slum and SRH households. This study established the significance of ‘lack
of satisfaction and well-being’ as a key aspect of the impoverishment of the slum-displaced population. The displaced population with a
tenured house and ‘hard infrastructure’ in the resettlement colonies adapts to the social structure, modifies social and household
practices, and delves into improved energy choices, improving living standards. Yet, this minimally decent life fails to provide the
occupants with environmental and life satisfaction and well-being. The study establishes that occupant behaviour is individual
predilection oriented, and the socio-spatial context of ‘built-environment,’ with following rational modification, can improve the
population's energy consumption and environmental satisfaction.

Introduction

Enhanced economic growth has escalated housing energy demand in the global south (Mastrucci et al., 2019), and it is further going to
increase. Energy consumption in the residences of India has increased in the last two decades, where the share with energy access has
increased from 55 % in 2001 to approximately 80 % in 2017 (Chunekar & Sreenivas, 2019). By 2050, India's residences are foreseen to
account for approximate 85 % of the nation's ground area, and residential electricity use has increased 50 times since 1971 (Chunekar &
Sreenivas, 2019). Currently, Indian households consume approximately 25 % of the nation's total electricity, despite nearly a quarter of all
households lack access to electricity connection (IEA, 2021). The residential growth combined with increasing income and technological

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19/2/24, 15:37 Interpreting the energy choices and environmental satisfaction determinants in low-income housing typologies: Cases from slum…
advancement would result in people purchasing more appliances and consuming more electricity in future (Khosla, 2018). Recent urban
transition, and government policies to provide electricity to all homes, is projected to further increase appliance ownership and electricity
consumption five to six times by 2030.

Unprecedented urbanization, representing half of world population (Marx et al., 2013), globalization, and growing middle-income group
with higher affordability have increased energy consumption (Liu, 2022; Liu et al., 2017), however, negatively impacting environment.
With global warming and climate change, regulating the domestic energy consumption turns essential (Akhmat et al., 2014; Akpan &
Akpan, 2012).

Apart from climate characteristics, varying factors such as market availability, cost-effectiveness, dwelling and demographic features,
capital and household income patterns influence the behaviour impacting energy choices (Cabeza et al., 2014; Ekholm et al., 2010; Rao &
Ummel, 2017). Other financial factors such as price, data, expertise and know-how and behavioural factors such as mindset, ethics and
values have been identified in most appliance-based researches to impact an occupant's energy choices (Sakah et al., 2019).

However, there is scant research that underpins the direct cause-effect relationship between social practices and energy choice behaviour.
Particularly, daily household activities and occupants' daily routinised type of behaviour mould their need for built-environment space
and appliances, and impact their appliance purchase decisions and energy consumption (Foulds et al., 2016). Consequently, this
interaction between energy, built-form and household practices might impact the individual well-being, health and life satisfaction.

The more-than-proportionate urban growth in the developing economies, owing to high rural-to-urban migration, have prompted
sprawling growth of informal settlements or ‘slums’ across megacities. Global literature, particularly ethnographic and longitudinal
studies have encountered economic struggles of migrants, social isolation and marginalisation challenges, poverty and health inequities
(Yang et al., 2023), socio-physical liveability challenges within low-income communities (Sarkar & Bardhan, 2020c). Less disposable
income, coupled with insecurity in tenancy and occupancy and limited employment opportunities have made living conditions difficult
for the under-privileged worldwide. Housing despair involving poor-quality hyperdense makeshift housing, lack of availability of
habitable space with inappropriate living conditions and lack of access to clean water and sanitation have intensified the anguish within
these deprived communities, exposing them disproportionately to physical and social risks and acting as a stressor to the poor human
immune system (Govender et al., 2011).

In response to the social and physical infrastructure pressure that the slum upsurge imposes on the existing city fabric, the metro-city
authorities in cities like Mumbai, with at least 42 % slum population (Varghese & Jana, 2019), have adopted ‘resettlement’ approach,
similar to Indonesia, Vietnam, Spain and Brazil. In Mumbai, slum dwellers are shifted to mass housing, under Slum Redevelopment Policy
(2000) with provision of legal entitlement, secured tenancy, 250 sq. ft. single-room apartment with individual water supply connection,
and sanitation. Despite the socio-economic conditions of the population remain the same, this shift in built-environment setting often
modify few household practices, thereby influencing their energy demand.

Nevertheless, the question remains whether these policy-driven infrastructural upgradations with modified occupant behaviour and household
practices have positively impacted occupants' well-being and satisfaction?

Theoretical development on ‘decent living standards (DLS)’ initiated by Maslow's ‘hierarchy of needs’ (McLeod, 2007), and subsequent
theories suchlike ‘Autonomy’, Soren Reader's ‘essential needs’, Nussbaum's ‘social minimum’ (Alexander, 2008) and, Rao's ‘decent living
standards’ (Rao & Min, 2018) have pinned on deriving at a set of materialistic prerequisites that can offer basic living to the population.
However, in these afore-mentioned theories, the problem lies in ‘limit-setting’, where determining a prescriptive list of key capabilities
turns controversial. The question arises as to specify a standard for judging the ‘human needs’ while ignoring the holistic aspect of
whether people are satisfied with the ‘minimally decent life’. While the social minimum approaches are often anchored in a thin vision to
recognize what is valuable to human for survival and decent living, and aid in bringing out population from deprivation, the sensitiveness
to liveability, well-being and more importantly, individual satisfaction remains ignored.

Despite being equipped with ‘hard’ infrastructure, discomfort and distress in Mumbai's slum rehabilitation housing (SRH) has been
comprehensively deliberated in literature. Poor built-environment concerning lack of windows, environment-insensitive building designs,
hyper-density, lack of integrated open spaces have not only wedged their living conditions, but also has impacted their health (Jana et al.,
2022), socio-physical liveability (Sarkar & Bardhan, 2020c), thermal discomfort (Sarkar & Bardhan, 2020a) among the disadvantaged
population. The distress got intensified due to degrading health issues such as frequent skin and stomach disorders, and upper respiratory
diseases like Tuberculosis owing to disadvantaged-location (Jana et al., 2020), extreme household air pollution (HAP) (Lueker et al., 2020),
and poor built-environment design (Pardeshi et al., 2020).

It is often assumed that low-income households belonging to lower socio-economic group own less energy intensive appliances, thereby
belonging to the bottommost level of the electricity consumption hierarchy, and suffering from fuel poverty (Debnath et al., 2019). But
currently, the low-income households have been observed to own various energy appliances as a measure of social upgrade, aspiration,
status upliftment, and comfort achievement; often resulting in a greater energy burden (Hernández & Bird, 2010). Furthermore, higher
household size, higher occupancy rates often force them to consume more electricity. But, in turn, higher energy consumption becomes a
financial burden on this population, thereby underlining the relevance of conducting the study in disadvantaged societies (Brunner et al.,
2012; Langevin et al., 2013; Xu & Chen, 2019). In India, slum households spend a greater proportion (around 15 %) of their disposable

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income on household energy (Sarkar & Bardhan, 2020a). Therefore, understanding the drivers of energy demand, and environmental
satisfaction becomes necessary in disadvantaged areas where space constraints coupled with financial restrains lead occupants to
struggle for availing essential services.

Worldwide literature has discussed concepts of alternative energy choices (Rodríguez et al., 2018; Zhao et al., 2018), energy burden
(Hernández & Bird, 2010; Langevin et al., 2013), energy poverty (Sánchez et al., 2018), and energy justice (Willand & Horne, 2018; Xu &
Chen, 2019) within low-income communities. Nevertheless, few researches have investigated the impact of built-environment
characteristics and occupant behaviour on appliance ownership and particularly, with a focus on occupants' environmental satisfaction
within low-income settlements. Additionally comparing the effects for horizontal slums and vertical SRHs turns essential to deeply
explore the impact of built-environment setting along with associated socio-cultural modulations on their appliance ownership patterns,
residential energy consumption, and environmental satisfaction.

The theoretical base of this archetypical study questions whether simple housing and infrastructure upgradation influence energy choice
behaviour and promote decent living and satisfaction among poverty-stricken population. Entrenching on theories of interrelationship
between decent living, energy choices and individual satisfaction, the aim of this study is to interpret the built-environment and occupant
behaviour related factors that impact energy choice and environmental satisfaction among the low-income settlements, further,
promoting decent living. The multi-fold novelty of this study lies in i), assessing the influence of occupant behaviour and built-
environment characteristics on household appliance ownership, energy consumption and environmental satisfaction and ii), recognizing
the difference between the two distinct low-income archetypes. The research objectives are to analyse the impact of built-environment
and occupant behaviour on energy consumption and environmental satisfaction between slum and slum rehab households, specifically, to
test the impact of appliance ownership, their operational behaviour. The findings will aid in informing strategies to reduce excessive
residential energy use through environment-sensitive built-environment design interventions, dissemination of knowledge and
awareness to imbibe energy consciousness behaviour within an individual, while accommodating one's satisfaction. The findings of this
study would pave way towards designing better energy-efficient policies for the low-income societies in developing nations.

This study is structured in the following manner. Section 2 sets up the contextual premise of the study through reviewing literature.
Section 3 outlines the survey design, research methodology and statistical analyses. The results of the study are showcased in Section 4
and are assessed against the current works on residential energy behaviour, considering how an individual's energy time-use, behaviour
influence their satisfaction and appliance ownership patterns. The final section concludes by reflecting on the policy recommendations
and strategies to achieve sustainable residential energy use and improve individual satisfaction.

Section snippets

Theoretical background

Researchers worldwide have defined a set of universal, irreducible and fundamental set of material and tangible prerequisites for
achieving basic human well-being. This study attempts to explore the built-environment and behaviour-related essential constituents
affecting energy choices and environmental satisfaction, thereby influencing well-being of an individual. The psychological Theory of
reasoned Behaviour/Planned Behaviour/Reasoned Action (TRB) predicts human behaviour based on individual …

Research methodology

A systematic process-oriented assessment approach was implemented based on a sequential heuristic, taking Mumbai slums and SRHs as
prototype. The research design, contributing to the current challenges of decent living among the constrained society is shown in Fig. 2.
This research enquiries the behavioural changes and satisfaction due to shift in living conditions. Literature suggest that the changes are
expected in energy consumption pattern and the trade-offs due to new living conditions.…

Appliance ownership and occupant behaviour characteristics

Although the socio-economic conditions remain similar in slums and SRHs, the effect of built-environment shift from low-rise slum
tenements to apartments of high-rise mass housing profoundly impacted their household electricity demand via an alteration of occupant
behaviour and other household and socio-cultural practices. While 95–100 % of the households in both slums and SRHs had mobile
phones and ceiling fans, ownership and usage of space-intensive electrical appliances such as computers,…

Limitations of the study

This study delivered a comprehensive knowledge on the interrelationship between energy consumption, environmental satisfaction,
household characteristics and occupant behaviour; however, the results obtained are restricted by few limitations; the sample size
availability, the time duration for which electricity bill data was collected, and lastly, tendency of biases in gauging socio-economic and
behavioural patterns.

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19/2/24, 15:37 Interpreting the energy choices and environmental satisfaction determinants in low-income housing typologies: Cases from slum…
Fund restrictions and challenges while surveying in low-income households with…

Conclusions and study implications

This study utilises survey of 643 slum and slum rehab households conducted between February and March 2020 in Mumbai, to
understand the occupant behaviour, electricity usage patterns, appliance ownership levels, energy choices and self-reported
environmental satisfaction within these space-constrained and financially restrained settlements. This study utilises a comparative lens
and further demonstrates the differences in relationship between the above-mentioned parameters in the two…

CRediT authorship contribution statement

A.S. has contributed to conceptualization, data curation, investigation, writing and editing original manuscript. A.J. has contributed to the
fund acquisition, supervision and validation, formal analyses, conceptualization, and review and editing of the manuscript.

All authors approved the final manuscript.…

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interests.…

Acknowledgement
The survey was funded by Ministry of Education, Government of India under the FAST scheme [14MHRD005].…

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