Social constructs of energy poverty and the resulting capability deprivations in rural India

Abstract

This PhD project studies energy poverty in rural India in order to understand its underlying social constructs and effect on people’s well-being. A core inspiration for undertaking this research stems from my profound interest in understanding the way in which people’s energy demands, energy sources, and services interact with their social systems, such as their day-to-day routines, established norms, well-accepted traditions, and culture. In so doing, this project aims to contribute towards achieving India’s goal to universalise modern energy access to all. Presently, India suffers from longstanding energy poverty, with about 239 million people unconnected to electricity and about 800 million relying on harmful solid fuels for cooking. This study has three objectives: (1) to understand the links between people’s livelihood practices and household decisions in relation to energy sources and services; (2) to understand how the energy poor’s capabilities are influenced by their choice of energy sources; and (3) to understand the role that social structure has on persistent energy poverty and find out ways to break the energy poverty cycle.This project represents a niche of studies that investigate energy poverty from an undervalued realm of social science. It benefits from an emerging conceptualisation that strongly argues for a research lens that navigates beyond the economic and technological influences of energy systems and unpack the relationship between energy and society. This novel concept acknowledges that demand for energy is not for energy itself, but for undertaking services required by people as members of society. Energy, therefore, is intricately intertwined with social systems that shape people’s needs, choices, decisions, and opportunities. To unpack this complex connection between energy and society, this project applies two prominent social theories: the Capability Approach (CA) and Structuration Theory.This research employs a qualitative approach of inquiry. Techniques applied for data collection comprise a set of in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, and observation. These techniques provide valuable groundwork for gathering a subjective understanding of people’s life experiences, both individual and collective, values, societal dominations, and energy practices. Fieldwork for the study was undertaken in the Chittoor district in the state of Andhra Pradesh, India.Three important findings have arisen from this project. First, a household’s energy choice decisions do not occur in isolation. To understand why households choose one cooking fuel over another, one must understand how every decision, not just those regarding fuel choice, is made at a household level. It helps explain a household’s priorities and the underpinning criteria for prioritisation. The structure of society plays a crucial role in this prioritisation.Second, energy poverty should not be measured against the amount of energy a household has consumed or how many households have access to modern energy sources. It should be measured based on the choices and opportunities energy sources provide to achieve well-being. Importantly, this study demonstrates that access to electricity improves people’s well-being, whereas the use of solid cooking fuels deprives the energy poor from achieving capabilities that lead to a quality life. Additionally, it argues that energy poverty is not only an outcome of the unavailability or unaffordability of modern forms of energy, but also of firmly rooted social inequalities and injustices.Third, people’s choice of cooking fuels is intertwined with established social norms and traditions. The use of solid cooking fuels is embedded in traditional beliefs, income-generating practices, social norms, and culture. It is therefore more difficult for the energy poor to reject their traditional fuels than to adopt modern alternatives. This is why, regardless of the availability and even adoption of a modern cooking fuel, the use of traditional fuels continues, resulting in the persistence of energy poverty across time and scale.A central policy implication emerges from these findings. It is that even though improving the supply infrastructures of modern energy sources, as well as their mechanisms and financial incentives, is undoubtedly critical, this alone is not sufficient to entirely alleviate energy poverty. As this thesis demonstrates, people’s choice of energy is rooted in society. It therefore argues for developing interventions for the alleviation of energy poverty in light of social and contextual barriers, which can be understood from bottom-up mechanisms and local-level planning processes.