IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/enepol/v39y2011i7p4022-4031.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Are micro-benefits negligible? The implications of the rapid expansion of Solar Home Systems (SHS) in rural Bangladesh for sustainable development

Author

Listed:
  • Komatsu, Satoru
  • Kaneko, Shinji
  • Ghosh, Partha Pratim

Abstract

This paper examines the multiple benefits of the adoption of Solar Home Systems (SHS) and discusses the dissemination potential for sustainable rural livelihoods in developing countries. Based on a household survey conducted in rural Bangladesh, we first identify the impact of SHS on the reduction in energy costs and compare purchasing costs. We then examine household lifestyle changes following the adoption of SHS. Finally, we consider several price-reduction scenarios to examine the potential demand for SHS and to evaluate its future dissemination potential. The results of the analysis indicate that households with SHS successfully reduce their consumption of kerosene and dependency on rechargeable batteries, with the cost reductions accounting for some 20-30% of monthly expenditures on SHS. Moreover, most households with SHS can enjoy its benefits, including electric lighting, watching television, and the ease of mobile phone recharging at home. Further, the price reduction can make possible potential demand in more than 60% of households without SHS, while additional price reductions promote the purchase of even larger SHS packages. This study concludes that even though the scale of single SHS is small, the micro-benefits for each household and the dissemination potential are substantial.

Suggested Citation

  • Komatsu, Satoru & Kaneko, Shinji & Ghosh, Partha Pratim, 2011. "Are micro-benefits negligible? The implications of the rapid expansion of Solar Home Systems (SHS) in rural Bangladesh for sustainable development," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(7), pages 4022-4031, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:enepol:v:39:y:2011:i:7:p:4022-4031
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421510008463
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    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. Martinot, E. & Cabraal, A. & Mathur, S., 2001. "World Bank/GEF solar home system projects: experiences and lessons learned 1993-2000," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 39-57, March.
    2. van der Zwaan, Bob & Rabl, Ari, 2004. "The learning potential of photovoltaics: implications for energy policy," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32(13), pages 1545-1554, September.
    3. Byrne, John & Shen, Bo & Wallace, William, 1998. "The economics of sustainable energy for rural development: A study of renewable energy in rural China," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 45-54, January.
    4. Acker, Richard H & Kammen, Daniel M, 1996. "The quiet (energy) revolution : Analysing the dissemination of photovoltaic power systems in Kenya," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 24(1), pages 81-111, January.
    5. Albrecht, Johan, 2007. "The future role of photovoltaics: A learning curve versus portfolio perspective," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(4), pages 2296-2304, April.
    6. Barua, Dipal C., 2001. "Strategy for promotions and development of renewable technologies in Bangladesh: experience from Grameen Shakti," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 205-210.
    7. Islam, A.K.M. Sadrul & Islam, Mazharul & Rahman, Tazmilur, 2006. "Effective renewable energy activities in Bangladesh," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 31(5), pages 677-688.
    8. Hossain Mondal, Md. Alam, 2010. "Economic viability of solar home systems: Case study of Bangladesh," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 35(6), pages 1125-1129.
    9. Urmee, Tania & Harries, David & Schlapfer, August, 2009. "Issues related to rural electrification using renewable energy in developing countries of Asia and Pacific," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 354-357.
    10. Gustavsson, Mathias & Ellegård, Anders, 2004. "The impact of solar home systems on rural livelihoods. Experiences from the Nyimba Energy Service Company in Zambia," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 29(7), pages 1059-1072.
    11. Linguet, L. & Hidair, I., 2010. "A detailed analysis of the productivity of solar home system in an Amazonian environment," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 14(2), pages 745-753, February.
    12. Stutenbäumer, Ulrich & Negash, Tesfaye & Abdi, Amensisa, 1999. "Performance of small-scale photovoltaic systems and their potential for rural electrification in Ethiopia," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 35-48.
    13. Wamukonya, Njeri, 2007. "Solar home system electrification as a viable technology option for Africa's development," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 6-14, January.
    14. World Bank, 2010. "World Development Indicators 2010," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 4373, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. 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.
    2. Komatsu, Satoru & Kaneko, Shinji & Ghosh, Partha Pratim & Morinaga, Akane, 2013. "Determinants of user satisfaction with solar home systems in rural Bangladesh," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 52-58.
    3. Brunet, Carole & Savadogo, Oumarou & Baptiste, Pierre & Bouchard, Michel A., 2018. "Shedding some light on photovoltaic solar energy in Africa – A literature review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 325-342.
    4. Friebe, Christian A. & Flotow, Paschen von & Täube, Florian A., 2013. "Exploring the link between products and services in low-income markets—Evidence from solar home systems," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 760-769.
    5. Mollik, Sazib & Rashid, M.M. & Hasanuzzaman, M. & Karim, M.E. & Hosenuzzaman, M., 2016. "Prospects, progress, policies, and effects of rural electrification in Bangladesh," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 553-567.
    6. Urmee, Tania & Md, Anisuzzaman, 2016. "Social, cultural and political dimensions of off-grid renewable energy programs in developing countries," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 159-167.
    7. Holtorf, Hans & Urmee, Tania & Calais, Martina & Pryor, Trevor, 2015. "A model to evaluate the success of Solar Home Systems," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 245-255.
    8. Pode, Ramchandra, 2013. "Financing LED solar home systems in developing countries," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 25(C), pages 596-629.
    9. Rigter, Jasper & Vidican, Georgeta, 2010. "Cost and optimal feed-in tariff for small scale photovoltaic systems in China," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(11), pages 6989-7000, November.
    10. Kurata, Masamitsu & Matsui, Noriatsu & Ikemoto, Yukio & Tsuboi, Hiromi, 2018. "Do determinants of adopting solar home systems differ between households and micro-enterprises? Evidence from rural Bangladesh," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 129(PA), pages 309-316.
    11. Mandelli, Stefano & Barbieri, Jacopo & Mereu, Riccardo & Colombo, Emanuela, 2016. "Off-grid systems for rural electrification in developing countries: Definitions, classification and a comprehensive literature review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 1621-1646.
    12. Bond, M. & Fuller, R.J. & Aye, Lu, 2007. "A policy proposal for the introduction of solar home systems in East Timor," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(12), pages 6535-6545, December.
    13. Baurzhan, Saule & Jenkins, Glenn P., 2016. "Off-grid solar PV: Is it an affordable or appropriate solution for rural electrification in Sub-Saharan African countries?," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 1405-1418.
    14. Chaurey, A. & Kandpal, T.C., 2009. "Carbon abatement potential of solar home systems in India and their cost reduction due to carbon finance," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 115-125, January.
    15. Ahmed, Shamsuddin & Islam, Md Tasbirul & Karim, Mohd Aminul & Karim, Nissar Mohammad, 2014. "Exploitation of renewable energy for sustainable development and overcoming power crisis in Bangladesh," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 223-235.
    16. Nfah, E.M. & Ngundam, J.M. & Vandenbergh, M. & Schmid, J., 2008. "Simulation of off-grid generation options for remote villages in Cameroon," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 33(5), pages 1064-1072.
    17. Wadud, Zia & Dey, Himadri S. & Kabir, Md. Ashfanoor & Khan, Shahidul I., 2011. "Modeling and forecasting natural gas demand in Bangladesh," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(11), pages 7372-7380.
    18. Jing Zhang & Roger Raufer & Lingxuan Liu, 2020. "Solar Home Systems for Clean Cooking: A Cost–Health Benefit Analysis of Lower-Middle-Income Countries in Southeast Asia," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(9), pages 1-14, May.
    19. Jha, Sunil Kr. & Bilalovic, Jasmin & Jha, Anju & Patel, Nilesh & Zhang, Han, 2017. "Renewable energy: Present research and future scope of Artificial Intelligence," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 297-317.
    20. Kanyarusoke, Kant E. & Gryzagoridis, Jasson & Oliver, Graeme, 2016. "Re-mapping sub-Sahara Africa for equipment selection to photo electrify energy poor homes," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 240-250.

    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:39:y:2011:i:7:p:4022-4031. 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.