<strong>Assessing Energy Poverty and Its Implications for Energy Resilience in BRICS Countries: A Fuzzy ANP and Modified ELECTRE III MCDA Approach</strong>

This study develops a Multidimensional Energy Poverty Index (MEPI) to assess energy poverty and its implications for energy resilience across Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. Energy poverty is treated as the deficit side of energy resilience, where lower deprivation in accessibility, affordability, cleanliness, and efficiency indicates stronger resilience. The index combines 16 indicators and applies an integrated multi-criteria decision analysis framework. Fuzzy Analytic Network Process is used to derive dimension and indicator weights, while a modified ELECTRE III method with triangular fuzzy performance scores is used to rank countries under data uncertainty and resolve close-ranking cases through continuous credibility values. Using 2019 data from the IEA World Energy Outlook 2020 and World Bank Open Data, the results show that energy accessibility receives the highest dimension weight (0.2869), followed by affordability (0.2625), cleanliness (0.2319), and efficiency (0.2187). Access to electricity is the most influential indicator, whereas mobile cellular subscription has the lowest weight. The country ranking identifies China as the least energy-poor BRICS country, Brazil and Russia as a middle-performing group, and India and South Africa as the most energy-poor. Robustness tests, including Monte Carlo weight simulation, threshold sensitivity analysis, and comparison with weighted-sum and TOPSIS rankings, confirm the stability of the main findings. The study offers a policy-relevant framework for identifying country-specific energy poverty hotspots and guiding resilience-oriented energy policy