Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Energy Policy journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/enpol Social engagement and socio-genesis of energy poverty as a problem in Spain Alexia Sanz-Hernández ⁎ Department of Psychology and Sociology, University of Zaragoza, Spain GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Social engagement Impact Energy policy Energy poverty Energy justice Media ABSTRACT The current paper provides an in-depth analysis of actors’ engagement and its impact on the conceptualization and social perception of energy poverty, its analysis and the design of energy and social policies to confront it. Energy poverty in Spain is mentioned from 2012, conceptualized in 2013 and amplified, becoming socially visible, from 2014, when the phenomenon was quantified after the country deficient condition deterioration. Until 2017, the different actors express themselves through media, generating an impact that has been studied from a mixed design combining contents analysis with qualitative analysis. A triple analytical approach: chronological, thematic and ‘of actors’ has been applied to 487 journalistic articles and press releases. In conclusion, the actual impact of engagement is defined in three fundamental aspects: the establishment of a social base knowledge about energy poverty; the contribution to socializing and mobilizing dynamics which led to institutional response and decisions making at different levels of social and energy policies; and, thirdly, to the creation of a collective framework of understanding and confrontation of the problem of unequal access to energy resources, which has fostered debate and reflection around energy unfairness and acknowledgement of energy vulnerability. 1. Introduction The objective of this article is to show how the concept of "energy poverty" in Spain is evolving, mainly through the explanation of the changes in the discourse within the media. Further to analyse the in- tervention of the main actors in the mass media debate whose intention is also is to generate an impact for the adoption of common solutions over a very complex problem. Energy poverty as an object of research has been approached in different ways. The prevailing line has been the quantification, as we see in the pioneering works for its definition and measurement ad- dressed by Boardman (1991) or in the later ones of Grevisse and Brynart https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2018.10.001 ⁎ Correspondence address: Department of Psychology and Sociology, Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, University of Zaragoza, Atarazanas Street, 4, 44003 Teruel, Spain. E-mail address: alexsanz@unizar.es. Energy Policy 124 (2019) 286–296 0301-4215/ © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. T