Mini Grids in Uttar Pradesh : A Case Study of a Success Story
Uttar Pradesh, the most populous state in India, has among the lowest levels of electricity connection in the country.1 Over 100 million people, at least half of the rural population, lack a formal connection to a distribution grid. The level of el...
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| Format: | Technical Paper |
| Language: | English |
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World Bank, Washington, DC
2017
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| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/181781512395036596/Mini-grids-in-Uttar-Pradesh-a-case-study-of-a-success-story http://hdl.handle.net/10986/29021 |
| Summary: | Uttar Pradesh, the most populous state
in India, has among the lowest levels of electricity
connection in the country.1 Over 100 million people, at
least half of the rural population, lack a formal connection
to a distribution grid. The level of electricity services
remains low despite the physical extension of the
state-owned grid to all official villages. Unelectrified
households are reluctant to apply for grid connection
because they expect electricity supply to be unreliable, and
they would have to spend money on coping strategies to
replace electricity. In addition, connecting individual
households in each village is costly to the state-owned
distribution utilities. Highly regulated tariffs and a high
cost of servicing remote areas mean that rural connections
promise few returns to the utilities.Electrification has
been a public policy priority for decades of successive
state and central governments across the political spectrum.
Public policy has maintained ambitious objectives to expand
grid services from the state-owned medium-voltage (MV)
distribution grid to rural areas. The state-owned grid has
electrified all cities and surrounding towns. The
high-voltage (HV) transmission grid extends throughout most
of the state, in contrast to other energy-poor countries in
Asia such as Cambodia, Indonesia, and Sri Lanka. Private
mini grid operators have occupied a small but growing space
in the rural electricity market in Uttar Pradesh since
around 2010. Several small companies, as well as individual
entrepreneurs, are now providing electricity services in
almost 1,900 settlements (villages and hamlets) in the
state, and have made about 37,000 connections (and
growing)Independent mini grid operators in Uttar Pradesh
have proven they can earn rural customers’ trust and their
business. Rural consumers’ simple energy needs can absorb up
to a third of households’ monthly expenditure without an
electricity connection.Mini grid operators are addressing
these gaps in service through renewable-based systems that
deliver power to underserved villages. They have gained
credibility as a more reliable service than the state-owned
grid in rural areas by providing a reliable solution to
residents’ and businesses’ lighting, phone charging, and
appliance-powering problems. They provide basic
light-emitting diode (LED) home lighting and a mobile phone
charging outlet to a household for a scheduled 6 to 8 hours
a day. |
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