Only 23% of rural LPG users rely on it exclusively, finds CEEW study

Around 73 per cent of rural households used LPG in the previous 90 days, but refill costs, last-mile delivery gaps and informal access continue to constrain sustained use

The use of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) among rural households in India is pervasive but a far lower proportion of those depend solely on the fuel.

 

In a survey, around 73 per cent of the rural households were found to have used LPG in the previous 90 days but only 23 per cent of them used just that.

 

Half of them rely on firewood as their primary fuel.

 

This is according to a report published by the Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW), a think tank.

 

It found 47 per cent of the LPG users received delivery at the doorstep, leaving the refill cost and last-mile logistics as the binding constraints.

 

The study covered 2,200 rural households across six states, 1,100 households in informal settlements, and over 1,000 migrant workers across 10 cities.

 

Access to LPG has expanded deep into rural India, cities’ informal settlements, and migrant worker settlements, but formal, registered access has not kept pace, the CEEW said.

 

“Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) and wider LPG expansion have dramatically increased access. The next generation of clean-cooking policy needs to solve sustained usage, affordability, formal access and last-mile delivery,” the CEEW said, adding that informal connections, taken through kirana stores, roadside dealers or unauthorised distributors at a premium, filled the gap left behind by challenges with last-mile delivery networks.

 

Migrant workers face the sharpest exclusion, evident from the fact that 79 per cent of them have no formal connection. It is the same for 11 per cent of the households in urban informal settlements.

 

Less than 4 per cent of the migrant workers are enrolled in the PMUY despite the 2021 policy change meant to extend the scheme to migrant families.

 

“At a refill price of ₹400 for a 14.2 kg LPG cylinder, at least 80 per cent of surveyed rural households, urban informal settlement households and migrant workers, report that they would transition to exclusive LPG usage. The median willingness to pay was ₹500 across the three groups. Both figures are below the current effective subsidised PMUY cylinder price of ₹642,” the report said.

 

LPG use was found to be higher among households in urban informal settlements at 70 per cent exclusive use, but 31 per cent of those without a formal connection say they were turned away for lacking documents such as address proof.

 

As a result, 11 per cent buy cylinders informally, paying ₹1,040 against a retail price of ₹803 at the time of the survey.

 

The Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas should consider raising the PMUY subsidy by around ₹200 per cylinder to bring the effective price closer to the ₹400 affordability threshold (to ensure exclusive use) identified across all three surveys, the CEEW said. 

Also, oil-marketing companies, in coordination with employers and contractors, should assist migrants and their families in special PMUY-enrolment drives, and pilot “pay-as-you-go smart-meter LPG kiosks”, which allow partial, flexible refills in migrant-dense areas, it said.