Energy Planning for Rural Areas

Overview

Rural areas of poorer countries are often at a disadvantage in terms of access to all types of services – roads, health facilities, markets, information, clean water. The high cost of providing these services in remote areas has led to new approaches being tried, based on self-help and the private sector rather than traditional government-led solutions. Energy services for household, agriculture and production are no exception. In the case of electricity, which has the potential to improve productivity and provide considerable welfare benefits (lighting, entertainment, etc.) traditional grid extension is no longer seen as the only solution. Decentralised supplies, whether at an individual household levelor at community level, are now an established, cost-effective alternative for the two billion rural people who are currently without access to mains electricity.

Further Information

• Electrification.PDF Decentralized rural electrification: the critical success factors by Ray Holland, Lahiru Perera, Teodoro Sanchez, Dr Rona Wilkinson
  
• 'Small is beautiful': making decentralised energy a reality - side event at the Commission for Sustainable Development, 8 May 2006, New York
  
• Group for Rural Infrastructure Development Nepal