IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/enepol/v88y2016icp299-309.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The politico-economics of electricity planning in developing countries: A case study of Ghana

Author

Listed:
  • Abdul-Salam, Yakubu
  • Phimister, Euan

Abstract

Off-grid technologies are increasingly being proposed as a way of ensuring cost efficient universal access to electricity in many developing countries. However, many un-electrified communities would prefer access to electricity via the national grid rather than off-grid technologies. Electricity planning based on cost efficiency alone could therefore be undermined by political pressure from discontented communities that are assigned off-grid technologies. Using a case study of un-electrified communities in Ghana, we develop an electricity planning algorithm based on hierarchical lexicographic programming and consider specifications where the priorities are adjusted to give weight to (1) cost efficiency and (2) political economy considerations so that communities with larger populations (and therefore votes) are given priority in terms of grid electrification. The results emphasise the need to incorporate the political economy considerations in the national planning of universal electrification, showing significant regional differences in terms of where grid extensions ought to be placed. Incorporating a political economy perspective in national planning also suggests that the most important policy trade-offs shift from considering the grid versus off-grid balance to focussing more on the effectiveness of grid investment in providing universal access.

Suggested Citation

  • Abdul-Salam, Yakubu & Phimister, Euan, 2016. "The politico-economics of electricity planning in developing countries: A case study of Ghana," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 299-309.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:enepol:v:88:y:2016:i:c:p:299-309
    DOI: 10.1016/j.enpol.2015.10.036
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421515301646
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.enpol.2015.10.036?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. Deichmann, Uwe & Meisner, Craig & Murray, Siobhan & Wheeler, David, 2011. "The economics of renewable energy expansion in rural Sub-Saharan Africa," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 215-227, January.
    2. Parshall, Lily & Pillai, Dana & Mohan, Shashank & Sanoh, Aly & Modi, Vijay, 2009. "National electricity planning in settings with low pre-existing grid coverage: Development of a spatial model and case study of Kenya," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(6), pages 2395-2410, June.
    3. Piet Buys & Uwe Deichmann & Craig Meisner & Thao Ton That & David Wheeler, 2009. "Country stakes in climate change negotiations: two dimensions of vulnerability," Climate Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 9(3), pages 288-305, May.
    4. Brown, David S. & Mobarak, Ahmed Mushfiq, 2009. "The Transforming Power of Democracy: Regime Type and the Distribution of Electricity," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 103(2), pages 193-213, May.
    5. Banerjee, Abhijit & Somanathan, Rohini, 2007. "The political economy of public goods: Some evidence from India," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(2), pages 287-314, March.
    6. Nguyen, Khanh Q., 2007. "Alternatives to grid extension for rural electrification: Decentralized renewable energy technologies in Vietnam," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(4), pages 2579-2589, April.
    7. Bhattacharyya, Subhes C., 2006. "Energy access problem of the poor in India: Is rural electrification a remedy?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(18), pages 3387-3397, December.
    8. Levin, Todd & Thomas, Valerie M., 2012. "Least-cost network evaluation of centralized and decentralized contributions to global electrification," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 286-302.
    9. Bhattacharyya, Subhes C., 2013. "To regulate or not to regulate off-grid electricity access in developing countries," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 494-503.
    10. Bawakyillenuo, Simon, 2012. "Deconstructing the dichotomies of solar photovoltaic (PV) dissemination trajectories in Ghana, Kenya and Zimbabwe from the 1960s to 2007," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 410-421.
    11. Pokharel, Shaligram, 2004. "Energy economics of cooking in households in Nepal," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 547-559.
    12. Amador, J. & Domínguez, J., 2005. "Application of geographical information systems to rural electrification with renewable energy sources," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 30(12), pages 1897-1912.
    13. Paul Bergey & Cliff Ragsdale & Mangesh Hoskote, 2003. "A Simulated Annealing Genetic Algorithm for the Electrical Power Districting Problem," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 121(1), pages 33-55, July.
    14. Kemausuor, Francis & Obeng, George Yaw & Brew-Hammond, Abeeku & Duker, Alfred, 2011. "A review of trends, policies and plans for increasing energy access in Ghana," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 15(9), pages 5143-5154.
    15. Zvoleff, Alex & Kocaman, Ayse Selin & Huh, Woonghee Tim & Modi, Vijay, 2009. "The impact of geography on energy infrastructure costs," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(10), pages 4066-4078, 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. Abdul-Salam, Yakubu & Phimister, Euan, 2016. "How effective are heuristic solutions for electricity planning in developing countries," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 14-24.
    2. Abdul-Salam, Yakubu & Phimister, Euan, 2019. "Modelling the impact of market imperfections on farm household investment in stand-alone solar PV systems," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 66-76.
    3. Brown, Alistair, 2016. "The need for improved financial reporting of a developing country energy utility," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 1448-1454.
    4. Bolukbasi, Gizem & Kocaman, Ayse Selin, 2018. "A prize collecting Steiner tree approach to least cost evaluation of grid and off-grid electrification systems," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 160(C), pages 536-543.
    5. Trotter, Philipp A. & Maconachie, Roy & McManus, Marcelle C., 2018. "Solar energy's potential to mitigate political risks: The case of an optimised Africa-wide network," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 108-126.
    6. Akbas, Beste & Kocaman, Ayse Selin & Nock, Destenie & Trotter, Philipp A., 2022. "Rural electrification: An overview of optimization methods," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 156(C).
    7. Karsu, Özlem & Kocaman, Ayse Selin, 2021. "Towards the Sustainable Development Goals: A Bi-objective framework for electricity access," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 216(C).
    8. Ciller, Pedro & Lumbreras, Sara, 2020. "Electricity for all: The contribution of large-scale planning tools to the energy-access problem," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    9. Adom, Philip Kofi & Insaidoo, Michael & Minlah, Michael Kaku & Abdallah, Abdul-Mumuni, 2017. "Does renewable energy concentration increase the variance/uncertainty in electricity prices in Africa?," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 81-100.
    10. Herbert, Caren & Phimister, Euan, 2019. "Private sector-owned mini-grids and rural electrification: A case study of wind-power in Kenya's tea industry," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 1288-1297.
    11. Yakubu Abdul-Salam & Euan Phimister, 2017. "Efficiency Effects of Access to Information on Small-scale Agriculture: Empirical Evidence from Uganda using Stochastic Frontier and IRT Models," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 68(2), pages 494-517, June.
    12. 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).
    13. Trotter, Philipp A. & McManus, Marcelle C. & Maconachie, Roy, 2017. "Electricity planning and implementation in sub-Saharan Africa: A systematic review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 1189-1209.

    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. Abdul-Salam, Yakubu & Phimister, Euan, 2016. "How effective are heuristic solutions for electricity planning in developing countries," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 14-24.
    2. Trotter, Philipp A. & McManus, Marcelle C. & Maconachie, Roy, 2017. "Electricity planning and implementation in sub-Saharan Africa: A systematic review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 1189-1209.
    3. Akbas, Beste & Kocaman, Ayse Selin & Nock, Destenie & Trotter, Philipp A., 2022. "Rural electrification: An overview of optimization methods," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 156(C).
    4. Bolukbasi, Gizem & Kocaman, Ayse Selin, 2018. "A prize collecting Steiner tree approach to least cost evaluation of grid and off-grid electrification systems," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 160(C), pages 536-543.
    5. Sanoh, Aly & Kocaman, Ayse Selin & Kocal, Selcuk & Sherpa, Shaky & Modi, Vijay, 2014. "The economics of clean energy resource development and grid interconnection in Africa," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 598-609.
    6. Karsu, Özlem & Kocaman, Ayse Selin, 2021. "Towards the Sustainable Development Goals: A Bi-objective framework for electricity access," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 216(C).
    7. Levin, Todd & Thomas, Valerie M., 2012. "Least-cost network evaluation of centralized and decentralized contributions to global electrification," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 286-302.
    8. Miguel, Edward & Wolfram, Catherine & Lee, Kenneth, 2016. "Experimental Evidence on the Demand for and Costs of Rural Electrification," Department of Economics, Working Paper Series qt1s55t761, Department of Economics, Institute for Business and Economic Research, UC Berkeley.
    9. Levin, Todd & Thomas, Valerie M., 2014. "Utility-maximizing financial contracts for distributed rural electrification," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 613-621.
    10. Trotter, Philipp A. & Maconachie, Roy & McManus, Marcelle C., 2018. "Solar energy's potential to mitigate political risks: The case of an optimised Africa-wide network," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 108-126.
    11. Ortega-Arriaga, P. & Babacan, O. & Nelson, J. & Gambhir, A., 2021. "Grid versus off-grid electricity access options: A review on the economic and environmental impacts," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    12. Abdul-Salam, Yakubu & Phimister, Euan, 2014. "Modelling the Impact of Market Imperfections on Farm Household Investment in Stand-Alone Solar PV," 88th Annual Conference, April 9-11, 2014, AgroParisTech, Paris, France 169742, Agricultural Economics Society.
    13. Michael Acheampong & Qiuyan Yu & Funda Cansu Ertem & Lucy Deba Enomah Ebude & Shakhawat Tanim & Michael Eduful & Mehrdad Vaziri & Erick Ananga, 2019. "Is Ghana Ready to Attain Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Number 7?—A Comprehensive Assessment of Its Renewable Energy Potential and Pitfalls," Energies, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-40, January.
    14. Herbert, Caren & Phimister, Euan, 2019. "Private sector-owned mini-grids and rural electrification: A case study of wind-power in Kenya's tea industry," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 1288-1297.
    15. 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).
    16. McPherson, Madeleine & Ismail, Malik & Hoornweg, Daniel & Metcalfe, Murray, 2018. "Planning for variable renewable energy and electric vehicle integration under varying degrees of decentralization: A case study in Lusaka, Zambia," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 151(C), pages 332-346.
    17. Isaacs, Stewart & Kalashnikova, Olga & Garay, Michael J. & van Donkelaar, Aaron & Hammer, Melanie S. & Lee, Huikyo & Wood, Danielle, 2023. "Dust soiling effects on decentralized solar in West Africa," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 340(C).
    18. Ciller, Pedro & Lumbreras, Sara, 2020. "Electricity for all: The contribution of large-scale planning tools to the energy-access problem," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    19. Trotter, Philipp A., 2019. "Ambitions versus policy design: Addressing issues of the Power Africa initiative's quantitative targets," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 900-906.
    20. Kocaman, Ayse Selin & Huh, Woonghee Tim & Modi, Vijay, 2012. "Initial layout of power distribution systems for rural electrification: A heuristic algorithm for multilevel network design," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 302-315.

    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:88:y:2016:i:c:p:299-309. 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.