Beyond the business case: Impacts and resilience post-adoption of decentralized renewable energy for rural livelihoods

Productive uses of energy – tied to the usage of energy for economically productive appliances – to catalyze improvements in livelihoods, healthcare, and education have gained increased attention recently from governments and donor organizations. Through an intensive qualitative field-study of 64 rural entrepreneurs in southern Indian state of Karnataka who adopted different types of Decentralized Renewable Energy Assisted Machines (DREAMs) to start or improve existing rural enterprises such as roti-making, blacksmithing, tailoring, and food-processing, we contribute toward understanding when, how, and for whom do such productive uses make a positive impact. Going beyond the analysis of financial returns, we present an integrated impact-resilience framework to analyze the non-financial and broader socio-economic impacts of improved electricity access for rural enterprises. We show that DREAMs activate a cascade of interlocking set of impacts and livelihood resilience measures. While there is a general appreciation that DREAMs may contribute to making the adopting households more resilient, we trace the pathways through which such resilience building might occur. The reorganizational effects of DREAMs on the economic and social fabric of rural life appear to be quite large and potent. Our observation of multi-faceted positive spillovers resulting from the adoption and use of DREAMs lends support for policy interventions to develop and support the local and regional ecosystems that undergird deployment of DREAMs in rural areas.