IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/enepol/v106y2017icp278-287.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Geographic and socio-economic barriers to rural electrification: New evidence from Indian villages

Author

Listed:
  • Dugoua, Eugenie
  • Liu, Ruinan
  • Urpelainen, Johannes

Abstract

The International Energy Agency estimates that more than a billion people remain without household electricity access. However, countries such as India have recently made major progress in rural electrification. Who has benefited from these achievements? We focus on 714 villages in six energy-poor states of northern and eastern India to investigate trends in electricity access. We use data both from the 2011 Census of India and an original energy access survey conducted in 2014 and 2015. During the three years that separated the surveys, distance to the nearest town and land area lose their power as predictors of the percentage of households in the village that has access to electricity. In this regard, the Indian government's flagship rural electrification program seems to have managed to overcome a major obstacle to grid extension. On the other hand, socio-economic inequalities between villages related to caste status and household expenditure remain strong predictors. These findings highlight the importance of socio-economic barriers to rural electricity access and alleviate concerns about remoteness and population density as obstacles to grid extension.

Suggested Citation

  • Dugoua, Eugenie & Liu, Ruinan & Urpelainen, Johannes, 2017. "Geographic and socio-economic barriers to rural electrification: New evidence from Indian villages," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 278-287.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:enepol:v:106:y:2017:i:c:p:278-287
    DOI: 10.1016/j.enpol.2017.03.048
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421517301921
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.enpol.2017.03.048?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Taryn Dinkelman, 2011. "The Effects of Rural Electrification on Employment: New Evidence from South Africa," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(7), pages 3078-3108, December.
    2. Betancourt, Roger & Gleason, Suzanne, 2000. "The Allocation of Publicly-Provided Goods to Rural Households in India: On Some Consequences of Caste, Religion and Democracy," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 28(12), pages 2169-2182, December.
    3. Slough, Tara & Urpelainen, Johannes & Yang, Joonseok, 2015. "Light for all? Evaluating Brazil's rural electrification progress, 2000–2010," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 315-327.
    4. Khandker, Shahidur R. & Barnes, Douglas F. & Samad, Hussain A., 2012. "Are the energy poor also income poor? Evidence from India," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 1-12.
    5. Chakravorty, Ujjayant & Pelli, Martino & Ural Marchand, Beyza, 2014. "Does the quality of electricity matter? Evidence from rural India," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 107(PA), pages 228-247.
    6. Oparaku, O.U., 2003. "Rural area power supply in Nigeria: A cost comparison of the photovoltaic, diesel/gasoline generator and grid utility options," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 28(13), pages 2089-2098.
    7. Kumar, Atul & Mohanty, Parimita & Palit, Debajit & Chaurey, Akanksha, 2009. "Approach for standardization of off-grid electrification projects," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 13(8), pages 1946-1956, October.
    8. repec:bla:rdevec:v:5:y:2001:i:1:p:130-44 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Golumbeanu, Raluca & Barnes, Douglas, 2013. "Connection charges and electricity access in Sub-Saharan Africa," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6511, The World Bank.
    10. Bhattacharyya, Subhes C. & Srivastava, Leena, 2009. "Emerging regulatory challenges facing the Indian rural electrification programme," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 68-79, January.
    11. repec:ucp:ecdecc:y:2006:v:54:i:2:p:369-404 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Winkler, Harald & Simões, André Felipe & Rovere, Emilio Lèbre la & Alam, Mozaharul & Rahman, Atiq & Mwakasonda, Stanford, 2011. "Access and Affordability of Electricity in Developing Countries," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(6), pages 1037-1050, June.
    13. Francesca Refsum Jensenius, 2015. "Development from Representation? A Study of Quotas for the Scheduled Castes in India," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(3), pages 196-220, July.
    14. Ashwini Deshpande, 2001. "Caste at Birth? Redefining Disparity in India," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 5(1), pages 130-144, February.
    15. Oda, Hisaya & Tsujita, Yuko, 2011. "The determinants of rural electrification: The case of Bihar, India," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(6), pages 3086-3095, June.
    16. Kumar, Sunil Mitra, 2013. "Does Access to Formal Agricultural Credit Depend on Caste?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 315-328.
    17. Sinha, Chandra Shekhar & Kandpal, Tara Chandra, 1991. "Decentralized v grid electricity for rural India : The economic factors," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 19(5), pages 441-448, June.
    18. repec:oup:wbrobs:v:27:y:2010:i:1:p:33-51 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Kaundinya, Deepak Paramashivan & Balachandra, P. & Ravindranath, N.H., 2009. "Grid-connected versus stand-alone energy systems for decentralized power--A review of literature," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 13(8), pages 2041-2050, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Pal, Ankit & Ilango, G. Saravana, 2024. "Design and techno-economic analysis of an off-grid integrated PV-biogas system with a constant temperature digester for a cost-effective rural application," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 287(C).
    2. Choudhury, Shibabrata & Parida, Adikanda & Pant, Rajive Mohan & Chatterjee, Saibal, 2019. "GIS augmented computational intelligence technique for rural cluster electrification through prioritized site selection of micro-hydro power generation system," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 142(C), pages 487-496.
    3. Kennedy, Ryan & Mahajan, Aseem & Urpelainen, Johannes, 2019. "Quality of service predicts willingness to pay for household electricity connections in rural India," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 129(C), pages 319-326.
    4. Sedai, Ashish Kumar & Jamasb, Tooraj & Nepal, Rabindra & Miller, Ray, 2021. "Electrification and welfare for the marginalized: Evidence from India," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    5. Pelz, Setu & Chindarkar, Namrata & Urpelainen, Johannes, 2021. "Energy access for marginalized communities: Evidence from rural North India, 2015–2018," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    6. Nock, Destenie & Levin, Todd & Baker, Erin, 2020. "Changing the policy paradigm: A benefit maximization approach to electricity planning in developing countries," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 264(C).
    7. Agrawal, Shalu & Harish, S.P. & Mahajan, Aseem & Thomas, Daniel & Urpelainen, Johannes, 2020. "Influence of improved supply on household electricity consumption - Evidence from rural India," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 211(C).
    8. Malakar, Yuwan, 2018. "Evaluating the role of rural electrification in expanding people's capabilities in India," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 492-498.
    9. Maria Luiza de Medeiros Galvão & Marco Aurélio dos Santos & Neilton Fidelis da Silva & Valdenildo Pedro da Silva, 2020. "Connections Between Wind Energy, Poverty and Social Sustainability in Brazil’s Semiarid," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-25, January.
    10. Gómez-Hernández, D.F. & Domenech, B. & Moreira, J. & Farrera, N. & López-González, A. & Ferrer-Martí, L., 2019. "Comparative evaluation of rural electrification project plans: A case study in Mexico," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 129(C), pages 23-33.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kennedy, Ryan & Mahajan, Aseem & Urpelainen, Johannes, 2019. "Quality of service predicts willingness to pay for household electricity connections in rural India," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 129(C), pages 319-326.
    2. Sedai, Ashish Kumar & Jamasb, Tooraj & Nepal, Rabindra & Miller, Ray, 2021. "Electrification and welfare for the marginalized: Evidence from India," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    3. Gupta, Ridhima & Pelli, Martino, 2021. "Electrification and cooking fuel choice in rural India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    4. Christopher Ksoll & Kristine Bos & Sarah Hughes & Anthony Harris & Arif Mamun, "undated". "Evaluation Design Report for the Benin Power Compact's Electricity Generation Project and Electricity Distribution Project," Mathematica Policy Research Reports 9f8974513ee745aaac3b5c62e, Mathematica Policy Research.
    5. Perez Sebastian,Fidel & Steinbuks,Jevgenijs & Feres,Jose Gustavo & Trotter,Ian Michael, 2020. "Electricity Access and Structural Transformation : Evidence from Brazil's Electrification," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9182, The World Bank.
    6. Chakravorty, Ujjayant & Pelli, Martino & Ural Marchand, Beyza, 2014. "Does the quality of electricity matter? Evidence from rural India," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 107(PA), pages 228-247.
    7. Duncan Chaplin & Delia Welsh & Arif Mamun & Nick Ingwersen & Kristine Bos & Erin Crossett & Poonam Ravindranath & Dara Bernstein & William Derbyshire, "undated". "Ghana Power Compact: Evaluation Design Report," Mathematica Policy Research Reports 8c1896c6f9af45f08347287c1, Mathematica Policy Research.
    8. Chaurey, Akanksha & Kandpal, Tara Chandra, 2010. "Assessment and evaluation of PV based decentralized rural electrification: An overview," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 14(8), pages 2266-2278, October.
    9. Blankenship, Brian & Kennedy, Ryan & Mahajan, Aseem & Wong, Jason Chun Yu & Urpelainen, Johannes, 2020. "Increasing rural electrification through connection campaigns," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 139(C).
    10. Urpelainen, Johannes & Yoon, Semee, 2017. "Can product demonstrations create markets for sustainable energy technology? A randomized controlled trial in rural India," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 666-675.
    11. Aditi Bhattacharyya & Daisy Das & Arkadipta Ghosh, 2017. "Electrification and Welfare of Poor Households in Rural India," Working Papers 1702, Sam Houston State University, Department of Economics and International Business.
    12. World Bank Group, "undated". "Africa's Pulse, No. 17, April 2018," World Bank Publications - Reports 29667, The World Bank Group.
    13. Richard S. J. Tol, 2023. "Navigating the energy trilemma during geopolitical and environmental crises," Papers 2301.07671, arXiv.org.
    14. Palit, Debajit & Bandyopadhyay, Kaushik Ranjan, 2016. "Rural electricity access in South Asia: Is grid extension the remedy? A critical review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 1505-1515.
    15. Aweke, Abinet Tilahun & Navrud, Ståle, 2022. "Valuing energy poverty costs: Household welfare loss from electricity blackouts in developing countries," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    16. Ashish Kumar Sedai, Rabindra Nepal, and Tooraj Jamasb, 2022. "Electrification and Socio-Economic Empowerment of Women in India," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 2).
    17. Thushyanthan Baskaran & Sonia Bhalotra & Brian Min & Yogesh Uppal, 2024. "Women legislators and economic performance," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 29(2), pages 151-214, June.
    18. Ye, Yuxiang & Koch, Steven F., 2021. "Measuring energy poverty in South Africa based on household required energy consumption," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    19. Santosh Kumar & Ganesh Rauniyar, 2018. "The impact of rural electrification on income and education: Evidence from Bhutan," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(3), pages 1146-1165, August.
    20. Lahimer, A.A. & Alghoul, M.A. & Yousif, Fadhil & Razykov, T.M. & Amin, N. & Sopian, K., 2013. "Research and development aspects on decentralized electrification options for rural household," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 314-324.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:enepol:v:106:y:2017:i:c:p:278-287. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/enpol .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.