Hisham Zerriffi

More than 2 billion people have come within the expanding reach of electricity access in the last two decades. Still, globally ~840 million people lack access to any form of electricity. As per SDG7 timeline, universal electrification should happen by 2030. From the point of view of strategies, the pursuit of universal electrification has two types of goals. One relates to efficiency. This could be economic or environmental efficiency - i.e. electrifying the largest population at the lowest cost or with lowest environmental burden. And the other relates to effectiveness – which mainly constitutes the social and developmental goals of electricity provision being sufficient, reliable, affordable and equitable. In this dissertation, I examine the challenges to these goals. Using modeling-based approaches on an example country (Tanzania), I first analyze one particular impediment to economic efficiency: grid-dominance in the electrification market and its impact on strategic investment decisions by off-grid developers. As far as effectiveness is concerned, I address one particular challenge: distributive concerns around electricity pricing. Such effectiveness concerns fall under the broader societal goals of justice and fairness. Key outcomes of this work include novel methodologies for incorporating non-technological factors into electrification modeling. In doing so, my research takes the techno-economic model beyond the least-cost metrics. Modeling results show that (for Tanzania) uncertainty around grid arrival risks large scale misallocation of potential off-grid investments and may leave a large segment of population without electricity. In order to achieve cost-efficiency as well as fair pricing – it appears that an affordability-based pricing produces a lower burden on grid connected customers than a constant price. Apart from the analytical part of my research, I also take a deep dive into understanding what justice could mean in the context of electrification – and show how electrification may face multiple moral trade-offs.

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Fossil fuel industries currently employ millions and contribute to local and national economies. However, to keep global warming well below 2°C, fossil fuels need to dramatically decline. Scholars in many academic fields are focusing on “just transition” strategies for mitigating the impact of fossil fuel industry declines on workers and their communities. The research on this topic is nascent, and limited to conceptualizing and defining the role of stakeholders in just transition planning, and investigating renewable energy jobs as an option for fossil fuel workers. In this dissertation, I conducted a systematic review of the academic literature on just transition to synthesize identified elements of just transition. Next, I collected a novel employment factors dataset and combined it with an integrated assessment model to analyze the energy sector employment implications of climate policies. I also assessed whether ‘local’ renewable jobs can be created for fossil fuel workers in key coal producing countries. Finally, I collected several novel datasets to quantify and compare the scale of current socio-economic dependency on coal at the district level in India. Three primary insights emerge from this research. First, just transition literature to date has focused on coal workers in OECD countries and is largely normative. The existing literature provides key elements of a just transition that vary in spatial scale, justice forms, and timeframe. Second, while renewable energy jobs could offset fossil fuel job losses in the aggregate in most countries, this is not true everywhere. Moreover, it may not always be feasible to create ‘local’ renewable jobs for fossil fuel workers. This highlights the need to focus on non-renewable industries for fossil fuel workers’ job transition. Third, there can be large variations in the scale and type of socio-economic dependency on fossil fuels within a country. Overall, this dissertation shows the need for a more holistic understanding of the implications of fossil fuel industry declines on workers and communities.

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Almost 40% of the global population relies on fuelwood to meet their daily cooking energy needs, accounting for over 50% of all wood extracted in many developing countries. This dependency can have negative impacts on forest stocks and climate change, and is not expected to decline without a major change in current polices. Consequently, there is a need for improved understanding of fuelwood dependency to both inform the transition to cleaner cooking solutions and for sustainable management of local forest resources to ensure supply for dependent communities in the interim. This requires a careful analysis of the long-term management of local forest and agroforestry resources, the particular fuel collection habits of local populations, and the impact of new cooking technologies and fuels on fuelwood consumption. However, understanding biomass extraction and its impacts on forest resources remains under-developed in comparison to demand-side issues of fuelwood consumption. I fill these gaps by first tracking household fuelwood collection behavior in two regions of India. The patterns indicate that fuelwood collection is a function of both socio-economic drivers and the resource base, and collection is not evenly spread out among villages. Next, I demonstrate the need to develop local level estimates of biomass renewability to isolate household fuelwood collection impacts on local forest resources. Then, I estimate the impact of cooking solutions on fuelwood consumption behavior and the circumstances under which households move away from forest fuelwood sources. Finally, I examine a national level transition to clean cooking in India over ten years, and conclude that it reduced pressure on forests and achieved modest climate change mitigation benefits with some uncertainty due to the extent of biomass renewability and inclusion of differing climate-forcing emissions. Overall, the dissertation elucidates the need for local level estimates to isolate household fuelwood extraction impacts on forests and climate change, and the need to carefully consider spatial scale and included emissions in future analyses and policy-making.  

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About 2.9 billion people, primarily in rural areas of low-income countries, do not have access to clean cooking fuels (e.g. gas and electricity). Instead, they burn solid fuels (e.g. firewood and coal) in polluting primitive cookstoves. These traditional cooking methods and associated solid fuel gathering practices, contribute to gender inequalities, forest degradation, climate change and millions of premature deaths annually due to air pollution. Even when households adopt (acquire) clean cooking solutions, often both solid and clean fuels are used. Past research has rarely focused on post-adoption fuel choices. Moreover, while socio-economic demographics like income and education are identified as key transition factors, these are not amenable to near-term change. I drew upon three influential behavior change and technology adoption theories to develop a conceptual framework of self-regulatory behavior change to understand post-adoption usage and expedite the transition process. I developed hypotheses involving psychological variables to explain the how and why of transition across the pre and post-adoption periods, which I tested in the context of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) use in rural India. I accessed gas purchase records for all LPG users (N= 25,000) across 126 villages in Karnataka and administered two cross-sectional household sample surveys (n1=402, n2= 205). Three novel insights emerge from this research. First, the majority of consumers do not use LPG as their primary cooking fuel and, contrary to studies based on self-reports, LPG use does not increase with experience or familiarity. This highlights the need for post-adoption interventions. Second, in line with theory, the transition is a five-stage process, wherein people in different stages have significantly different perceptions of the advantages, disadvantages, and self-confidence related to regular LPG use. Further, perceived disadvantages emerge as more influential during the transition compared to household wealth, highlighting the need for behavior change strategies. Third, the comparison of self-reports of use with purchase data shows 2/3rd of respondents over-reporting LPG use, highlighting the need to account for survey biases. Overall, the dissertation shows that the application of behavior change theories and the use of fuel sales data provided valuable insights about post-adoption fuel choice decisions.

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Producer participation in markets, including modernized food value chains (MFVCs) and conservation programs like payments for environmental services (PES), is promoted for both human development and environmental sustainability. Participation can benefit farmers but there are concerns that limiting producer choice and concentrating power with intermediaries could have negative consequences for wellbeing and sustainability. PES and MFVCs have similarities for participating producers, suggesting scope for cross-pollination and insight. However, the literatures remain largely separate, tend to consider a narrow set of indicators, and produce mixed results.This dissertation explores the following questions in the case of dairy farmers in Costa Rica: (1) How and when can producer participation in intermediary-driven food and environmental value chains lead to positive outcomes for wellbeing and sustainability? (2) How and when is it useful to consider PES and food value chains together? Using statistical and qualitative methods with 217 household surveys and 23 key informant interviews, this dissertation assesses how indicators of human wellbeing, broadly conceived, and agricultural practices differ between farms supplying MFVCs versus traditional dairy value chains, and between those who are and are not participating in PES. Chapter 2 uses an adaptive capacity framing to show that Costa Rican producers selling in MFVCs were likely better equipped to manage change than those selling in traditional markets. Chapter 3 provides evidence that wellbeing in MFVCs also varied between value chains: those selling via a multinational cooperative appear substantially better off than those selling to a private processor. Chapter 4 presents evidence that PES participants experienced limited material wellbeing benefits from participation; rather, values appeared to be an important motivator for many. Chapter 5 examines correlations between the use of more sustainable agricultural practices and participation in MFVCs and PES. MFVCs appear to be a stronger force than environmental values in shaping farm management choices. This dissertation highlights the value of a broad approach to wellbeing that considers non-material benefits and motivations alongside material ones. Considering Costa Rican PES and dairy market participation together highlights intermediaries and producer-intermediary relationships as important in influencing human and environmental outcomes when farmers participate in MFVCs and PES.

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More than one-third of the world’s population has inadequate access to modern energy services and suffers as a consequence. A better understanding of energy transition is vital for improving future programs. This thesis investigates the challenges of transitioning to modern energy services with the goal of informing policy-making. Chapter 2 is a review of the literature on energy analysis and energy system uptake by the households with a particular focus on rural regions. Building upon the findings in the literature, a new conceptual framework is developed that can act as a basis for developing new empirical and theoretical models of household energy system uptake and use. In Chapter 3, the private sector based approach to rural energy provision (i.e. electrification and Improved Cookstove (ICS) dissemination) is investigated by examining two enterprises in India. Results indicate that the private sector based approach to rural energy provision cannot be a universal solution. It further shows that enterprises are facing many challenges that are beyond their capacity to address, necessitating alternate approaches to private sector involvement.Chapter 4 and 5 investigate the uptake of ICS by commercial kitchens in Bangalore and its potential health implications. The attributes of ICS and Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) stove, as perceived by stove users and owners, are explored and the reasons for purchasing ICS are assessed. Results indicate that both groups mostly prefer LPG stoves and that ICS uptake is mainly motivated by economic factors. The potential health implications of this switch in the commercial kitchens are explored by investigating the stove’s emission characteristics (based on both secondary data and direct emission measurements), the stoves smokiness (as perceived by users and owners); and some health symptoms associated with stove smoke. Uptake of ICS by these commercial kitchens is found to potentially have adverse health implications. In brief, this thesis concludes that rural energy provision policies can be improved through a greater emphasis on the human dimension, comprehensive assessment of the target population, and ongoing evaluation of the programs’ outcomes given the major challenges in improving rural energy access and possibilities for spillovers into other market segments.

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