Realities and Challenges of Energy

Access in India
Findings and experiences from the largest energy
access survey in rural India

Abhishek Jain
Council on Energy, Environment and Water

23 February, 2017

National Consultation of SDG7, NITI Aayog

© Council on Energy, Environment and Water, 2015

CEEW: one of South Asia’s leading think-tanks

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Setting the context

▪ Why Energy Access?

– One of the fundamental necessities for development
– Public health burden, loss of productivity and efficiency

▪ Why India?
– Home to the maximum population with lack of electricity & clean cooking energy

▪ Why rural India?

– Significant disparity between urban and rural areas
– Urban poor

▪ Why the six states?

– Historically lagging behind in energy access and development
– Collectively a population of 400 million

Why this study?

51 Districts; 714 Villages; 8,566 households; 2.5 million data points

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A comprehensive and pragmatic approach to measure energy
access
▪ Existing statics – Hide, as much they reveal
– Number of villages/households electrified; Number of LPG connection

▪ Energy access is neither unidimensional nor binary

▪ Energy access has various facets and aspects Reliability

▪ Striking the balance between Affordability

– Detailing
– Measurable, replicable & scalable Health &
Safety Quality

▪ Identifying the barriers to access Availability

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A multi-dimensional, multi-tier approach

ACCESS MEASUREMENT
FRAMEWORK

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Looking beyond the connections (1/2)

Electricity Access – Multi-tier, multi-dimensional Framework

Tier
Tier 0 Tier 1 Tier 2 Tier 3
Dimension
Lighting + Air
Lighting + Basic
circulation +
entertainment / Tier 2 services + Medium
entertainment /
Capacity No electricity communication to Heavy loads
communication (TV/
(Radio/ Mobile) (>500W)
Computer) (~50-
(~1-50W)
500W)
Duration <4hrs >4hrs and <8hrs >8hrs and <20hrs >=20hrs

Reliability (Black-
5 or more days 2-4 days 1 day 0
out Days)

Quality* NH > 3; NL > 6 NH = 0-3; NL = 0-6 NH = 0-1; NL = 0-3 NH + NL = 0

Affordability Unaffordable Affordable

Legality Illegal Legal

*NH is number of high voltage days in a month causing appliance damage; NL is number of low voltage days in a
month limiting appliance usage.
NOTE: For dimensions where the categories span multiple tiers, only the higher tier values apply. For example,
affordability can only be categorised as Tier 1 or Tier 3. The same is the case for legality.

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Looking beyond at the connections (2/2)
Cooking Energy Access – Multi-tier, multi-dimensional Framework
Tier
Tier 0 Tier 1 Tier 2 Tier 3
Dimension

Only traditional fuel

used (firewood, dung- Only source of cooking fuel
Health & Safety A mix of traditional fuel and BLEN (Biogas, LPG,
cakes, agricultural includes BLEN
Electricity, Natural Gas) is used
residue)

Cooking less because of Unsatisfied with

Availability Neutral to availability Satisfied with availability
availability availability

Quality Quality of cooking is not adequate Quality of cooking is adequate

Affordability Not affordable Affordable

Either Difficult to use Neither difficult, nor Time

Convenience Both Difficult to use and Time consuming
or Time consuming Consuming

NOTE: For dimensions where the categories span multiple tiers, only the higher tier values apply. For example quality and
affordability dimensions can only take on Tier 1 or Tier 3. Health and safety can take on Tier 0, Tier 2 and Tier 3.

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What is the state of play?

ELECTRICITY ACCESS

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 Access to electricity is still very limited

Electricity Access – Six states Spread of rural households across electricity access
tiers - Six States
100%
80% 6% 3%
60% No Tier 0
96% Yes
40% Tier 1
69% 27%
20% Tier 2
37%
63% Tier 3
0%
Villages Households Households
Electrified Electrified above Tier 0

Grid connection and primary source of lighting

100%
Proportion of households

80%
60%
40%
20%
0%
Bihar Jharkhand Madhya Odisha Uttar Pradesh West Bengal
Pradesh
Grid electrified Grid as primary source of lighting

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Not all states or regions are equally bad or good
Spread of households across electricity access tiers
100%
Proportion of rural households

80%

60%

40% 79% 73% 71%

64%
20% 47%
25%
0%

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Why do a majority of households remain in the bottom-most
tier?

Bottlenecks at Tier 0
50% Lack of connection
43%
39%
Proportion of rural households

40%
34% 33%
28% 30%
30% 27%
24%
22%
20% 18% 18%
17% 16%
14% 13% 13%

10% 7% 7%
5%
4%
1% 2% 2%
0%
0%
Madhya Pradesh Bihar Jharkhand Uttar Pradesh West Bengal Odisha
Capacity Duration Quality Reliability

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Why a third of households still not connected to grid?
• 34% do no have grid infrastructure in the vicinity
Reasons for not having connection

60%
Proportion of rural households

50%

34%
40%

30%
31%
24%
20% 20%

25% 6%
10%
12% 10% 12%
8% 7%
0% 0%
Bihar Jharkhand Madhya Pradesh Odisha Uttar Pradesh West Bengal

Unavailability of Infrastructure Other Reasons

• For the remaining 66%:

– Affordability of connection (56%), perception gap on recurring expenditure (50%),
unreliable/poor supply (48%) : becomes the main reasons to not get a connection
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 Connections alone do not guarantee electricity access
– ~46% of electrified HHs remain in the bottom-most tier (Tier 0)
Daily duration of supply Evening hours of supply
100%
Proportion of electrified households

100%

80% >16 hours 80%

>4 hours
13-16 hours
60% 60% 4 hours
9-12 hours
3 hours
5-8 hours
40% 40%
2 hours
0-4 hours
1 hour
20% 20%
0 hours

0% 0%
Bihar Jharkhand Madhya Odisha Uttar West Bihar Jharkhand Madhya Odisha Uttar West
Pradesh Pradesh Bengal Pradesh Pradesh Bengal

– 50% HHs receive electricity only up to 12 hours a day

▫ 97.5% in West Bengal; 23.5% in Uttar Pradesh

– 31% HHs face 5 or more black-out day in a month

– 30% HHs face 4 or more low voltage days in a month

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How decentralised technologies fare?
Awareness about decentralised electricity options
100%
Proportion of rural households

85%
80%
80%
64% 65%
60% 52% 54%

40%
28%
16% 17% 18%
20% Daily duation of hours10%
for decentralised electricity technologies
5%
45%
0%
BIHAR JHARKHAND 40%
MADHYA ODISHA UTTAR WEST
PRADESH
35% PRADESH BENGAL

Micro-grid 30%Solar based electricity

25%
20%
• ~7.5% of households use
15% lanterns, SHS or micro-grids; ~5% rely exclusively
– ~3.5% use micro-grids
10%
5%

• 0%
91% of the micro-grid were diesel-based
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 12 24
SHS Solar Lantern Micro-grids

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Peoples’ perceptions and preferences about electricity
• Clear-cut preference for government to remain in-charge of energy provision
Support for decentralised energy technologies
• Nearly a third households expressed preference for a micro-grid over regular grid.
• ~78% rural households expressed preference for subsidy on solar lanterns in lieu of
subsidy on kerosene

Illegal and corrupt practices

• HHs in at least 80% of villages reported that electricity stealing exist in their village

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We are making progress, but lot more needs to be done!
• GARV2: From village electrification to HH electrification

• Eventually, moving towards “24x7” power for all.

– Monitoring

• Incentivising better supply (reliability reflective tariffs)

• Entitlement vs. Commodity – Beyond a threshold, incentivising cost-recovery

payments

• Leverage the strength of DRE solutions – particularly mini-grids

– Access to remote habitations
– Management of rural customers: service reliability, revenue collection
• Looking beyond households
– Community services: Healthcare; Education
– Productive applications

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What is the state of play?

COOKING ENERGY ACCESS

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 Clean cooking energy access is much more limited
▪ 6% households had to curtail their cooking needs on account of limited fuel availability

LPG adoption and use – rural areas (six states) 2015

100%
Proportion of rural households

80%

60%

40%

20%
Distribution of rural households across clean
22% 14%
0% 5% cooking energy access tiers - all six states
LPG Connection LPG as primary cooking LPG as only cooking
fuel fuel 5%2%
Yes No 15%
Tier 0
Tier 1
Tier 2
Tier 3
78%

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Cooking energy access remain low in all six states with Uttar
Pradesh performing marginally better
Spread of households across clean cooking energy access tiers
100%
Proportion of rural households

80%

60%
94% 92% Tier 3
40% 83% 83% 78%
68% Tier 2
20%
Tier 1
0% Tier 0

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Why 78% of rural households in these states do not have LPG?
• Affordability
100% 95%
• Upfront cost 88%

Proportion of HHs not having LPG

• Recurring cost 80% 72%

• Availability

connections
60%

Median one-way distance that a households travel to 42%

procure LPG cylinder 40%
12 11
Median one way distnace (Km)

10 9 20%

8 7 7
6 0%
6
LPG distributor High High monthly Lack of
4 3 not available in connection expenses Awareness
2 vicinity cost
0
BIHAR JHARKHAND MADHYA ODISHA UTTAR WEST
PRADESH PRADESH BENGAL

• Awareness
– Over 1/3rd of the households do not believe (or are unaware) that using LPG instead
of the chulha has positive health benefits
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 How traditional biomass fares?
▪ Biomass is not alwaysin LPG
Not interested free: Rural Households relying entirely on free-of-cost
biomass

Proportion of rural households

100%
Proportion of HHs without LPG

– Only 44% rural households

80%
63%
entirely depend
69%
59% 80% 69%
60% on51%free-of-cash biomass
57%
for cooking 66%
60% 54%
▪ Abundance of freely available biomass is
40%
38%
40%
42% 38%
31%
inversely correlated to LPG subscription
20%
20%
and interest in LPG
0% 0%
BIHAR JHARKHAND MADHYA ODISHA UTTAR WEST BIHAR JHARKHAND MADHYA ODISHA UTTAR WEST
PRADESH PRADESH BENGAL PRADESH PRADESH BENGAL

Monthly expenditure on cooking energy for

households reporting real outlay
▪ Biomass is not cheap: 2000

cooking energy (INR/moth)

Monthly expenditure on
1500
– Households that buy traditional fuel spend
more on their cooking energy than those 1000

using only LPG

500

▫ INR 563 vs INR 385 0

BIHAR JHARKHAND MADHYA ODISHA UTTAR WEST
PRADESH PRADESH BENGAL
All households spending some real cash for cooking energy
All household spending cash, but not on LPG
All household using only LPG

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How do decentralised technologies fare?
▪ Less than 1% rural households use improved cookstoves (0.74%) and biogas (0.21%)
for cooking
▪ 40% are interested in improved cookstoves, but only 5% in biogas
▪ Technology resilience & maintenance remains a major issue
– Improved cookstoves
▫ 90% of those who are unsatisfied with their IC, state frequent breakdown as one of the
reason
▫ More than 83% users state poor maintenance service as one of the reason

– Biogas plants
▫ 75% of those who are unsatisfied with their IC, state frequent breakdown as one of the
reason
▫ More than 82% users state poor maintenance service as one of the reason

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Peoples’ perceptions and preferences
▪ People don’t use chulha by choice For HHs with traditional chulha Too Time Consuming
as primary cooking arrangement No Yes
No 11% 33%
Difficult to Cook
▪ Clean cooking energy does not find as Yes 5% 51%

much priority

▪ Less than 1/4th of household prioritise

improved cookstoves Priority areas of government support for clean cooking
energy
– West Bengal (39%), Odisha (38%), 100%

proportion of rual households

Jharkhand (31%) 80%

60%
Rank 4

▪ Only 5% household prioritise biogas for 40% Rank 3

Rank 2
cooking 20%
Rank 1

– West Bengal (14%), Madhya Pradesh 0%

Improved Increased Improved Availability
(10%) biomass LPG subsidy biogas plant of LPG
cook stove

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CC Energy Access for all: Needs a multi-prong approach
Reducing the barriers from adoption to sustained use
– Competing with free-of-cash biomass : Needs to generate a bottom-up demand
– Awareness; Livelihoods

LPG
• Ujjwala – Recognised the barrier of upfront cost
– Added more than 10 million connections in less than a year
• Plans to add 10,000 new distributor

– EMI provision for APL households

Improved cookstoves
• Tier 4 cookstoves: Need to boost R&D
– Standardisation of fuel/pallestisation
– On-ground performance: Emissions; Resilience; Sustained use

Biogas
• At least 20 millions HHs could be effectively covered
– Biogas as a service - Enterprise based models: HHs or community-level
– Replicating the success stories

Technologies over the horizon: solar cookstoves

• Need to boost R&D | 23
Thank you

Abhishek Jain
abhishek.jain@ceew.in

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