Towards Energy Democracy in the World’s Largest Democracy

Raakhee Suryaprakash

As India observes her 69th Republic Day, it’s a good time to assess the state of the nation and her
citizens. Looking at the state of energy security in the world’s most populous democracy shows that India
needs to make Energy Democracy and Energy Justice central tenets of its power policy. Many villages
and towns in rural India, both remote and on the fringe of cities remain functionally unelectrified. India’s
massive power grid has largely let down her rural citizens. But the fact that it serves at the pleasure of its
urban citizen is not always good for the environment and the cause of sustainable development. Despite
repeatedly beating our renewable energy targets and having some of the largest solar fields in the world,
India’s power grid’s mainstay is still coal. Back-up generators are diesel powered! The dependence on
fossil fuels and our carbon-hungry economy are major hurdles to India’s path to prosperity. While the
developed world’s and China’s emissions fell, India was one of the few exceptions to the trend in
plateauing emissions. We are still commissioning over 200 thermal power stations and with many states
still power-deficit, government priority is electrification not green energy.

In order to phase out coal and gas as well as to keep global warming and greenhouse gas emissions in
check requires a firm commitment energy democracy. There is opportunity in the many unelectrified
communities and the skyrocketing prices of petrol and diesel. Petrol prices are at a 3-year high – selling
at Rs 72.43 per litre in the national capital. Diesel prices have also shattered records selling at Rs. 61.71
per litre in New Delhi. Gas subsidies and the increasing price of crude oil add to the deficit burden of the
India’s Union budget that will be tabled on February 1st. It’s in opting for renewables and involving the
community to ensure electrification through energy co-ops. Solar energy and wind energy have become
cheaper than coal. There are exciting start-ups and turnkey solutions providers in place to ensure that
opting for renewable energy is easy and affordable. As the Barefoot Engineers of Tilonia, Rajasthan
demonstrate, electrification using renewables can generate incomes and create livelihoods in
communities that don’t benefit from thermal power stations and coal and gas mining.

“Energy democracy means that everybody is ensured access to sufficient energy. Energy production
must thereby neither pollute the environment nor harm people. … this means that fossil fuel resources
must be left in the ground, the means of production need to be socialised and democratised, and we must
rethink our overall attitude towards energy consumption.”

While per capita energy consumption is still minimal, the fact is we urban Indians are benefitting from the
low-carbon lifestyles of our rural brethren. But the aspiration is energy security and power for prosperity
for all. Keeping in mind commitments to the Paris Climate Agreement, decentralized and renewable
energy solutions are the obvious choices.

There are many pilots in place and success stories showing that taking the renewable energy path has
manifold benefits. Indian Railways is saving lakhs of rupees with trains fitted with solar panels.
Individuals, institutions, companies and building societies are benefitting from installing rooftop solar
power systems. Forest-dwelling communities even in the heart of the Sundarbans are benefitting from
solar power which is reducing the risk of confrontations with India’s National Animal. Greenpeace India’s
Solar Shakti campaign shows the way as does Chennai’s own D. Suresh whose home stayed electrified
amidst both the Chennai Floods and Cyclone Vardah when power was shutoff in the grid. The biogas
plant out of his kitchen waste has made the LPG cylinder redundant in his home! ‘Solar’ Suresh is
advising schools, offices and building societies on how to become independent of the grid and the
cylinder. Energy Alternatives India also based out of Chennai has a vast online and print directory of
resources constantly updated to make adopting energy alternatives simpler. Rooftop wind energy
generators are becoming cheaper than an iPhone, thanks to the efforts of young innovators of Avant
Garde Innovations.

India in general and the southern states in particular have a very efficient network of self-help groups
(SHGs) – many women-only SHGs that are elevating communities from the clutches of poverty.
Corporate Social Responsibility has become mandatory for successful organizations thanks to
amendments in the Companies Act. These mechanisms make it conducive and feasible to institute rural
and urban community level energy co-operatives that can bring power to the powerless and make
electrification not only cheap and but profitable!

Medha Patkar, the economist turned social activist central to the Narmada Bachao Andolan, who was
recently a featured speaker at Saarang 2018, the cultural fest of IIT Madras, mentioned that living simply
is the best way to save resources and save the environment. Decentralization and subsidiarity need to be
adopted in electrification to ensure energy for all.

The global trend of the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer is intensified in India. According to
Wealth-X, India has 90 billionaires with a total wealth of $206 billion, ranked no. 7 of 11 countries with the
most billionaires. In the same country, as per World Bank statistics, we have the most people in the world
living below the poverty line – 224 millions – that’s 30 per cent of its population, while 800 million live on
less than 1.90 dollars a day. This income inequity can be addressed by addressing the inequity in energy
access. Universal access to renewable, sustainable and local energy as well as ensuring job creation in
the green energy sector that ensures fair pay and living wages to employees can elevate millions from the
poverty trap. The conditions to decentralize energy and involve the community in the profits of energy
generations makes this India’s moment in the sun. It remains to be seen whether the model becomes
mass action!