In Eastern Europe and Central Asia there are significant pressures for residential energy tariffs to rise, as government budgets are increasingly stretched and cannot afford to pay large energy subsidies. Further pressures for tariffs to rise come from environmental concerns, as the tariff levels that households now face do not cover the social costs of energy production. Because reforms that would increase energy tariffs are likely to affect significantly the poor and the middle class, their political feasibility may be questioned unless appropriate ways of cushioning the impacts can be devised.