Strengthening the sustainability of rural electrification projects: Renewable energy, management models and energy transitions in Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia

•The management model is a key issue for sustainability of electrification projects.•There are governmental, municipal, private, microenterprise or cooperative models.•A number of case studies in Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia are analysed.•Technical, economic, social, organizational, and environmental sustainability are studied.•Recommendations are given to strengthen sustainability by improving management model. Isolated small-scale renewable energy projects are a suitable option for providing access to electricity in rural areas. In such projects, establishing a suitable management model is a key issue for ensuring sustainability. The management models can be classified according to the ruling institution: government, municipality, private institution, microenterprise or cooperative. They may also differ with regard to sensitive features, such as the systems' ownership, level of users' participation, responsibility for the systems’ operation and maintenance, the users’ involvement in system installation processes and the administration of tariff payments. The existing literature lacks a comparative study highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of each kind of management model and their contribution to achieving technical, economic, social, organisational and environmental sustainability. To fill this gap, this study analyses and compares the impact of different management models through a number of case studies in Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia after 4 years of on-site work. Finally, general recommendations are given as results to strengthen all sustainability dimensions: among them, running comprehensive training programs to enhance local maintenance capabilities; reaching agreement with final electricity users to set a fair and affordable tariff rate and encouraging the involvement and self-organisation of the population to increase the sense of ownership. Such aspects are fulfilled more completely by management models based on microenterprises and cooperatives, due to their decisively higher community engagement, and should be stimulated by policy makers in the region.