High LPG prices are scorching the air pollution fight

News– How Removal of LPG subsidy and subsequent Price rise is affecting the air pollution and its wider acceptance in low income and rural households. 

As Per the India residential energy survey (IRES), LPG has now replaced biomass as the most common cooking fuel. Nearly 85 percent of Indian households have an LPG connection Compared to only 30 percent a decade back. This reversal of trends can be attributed to the success of Ujjwala, Consumption linked subsidies, and gradual strengthening of LPG distributorship. Under the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala yojana, the government distributed more than 80 million subsidized LPG connections. Recently Ujjwala 2.0 was launched to distribute 10 million free LPG connections which shows the government’s commitment and vision to promote clean cooking fuel. 

However, the battle is only half won as around 30 percent of households still rely on biomass as their primary cooking fuel. If the removal of LPG subsidy is continued it can further worsen the situation. 

What we need to do as a country to move needle further and to sustain country momentum on clean cooking energy access and thereby cleaner fuel for all. 

1. Reinstating LPG subsidies for low-income households -At the current refill prices, an average Indian household needs to spend at least 10 percent of monthly income on LPG to meet its all cooking needs. This becomes much more important when one factors the loss of livelihood and income due to pandemic. 
2. Government can reduce the number of beneficiaries and thereby overall cost. It can be done by various methods such as fixing an income cap on who can get subsidy or giving subsidy to only those who got their connections through Ujjwala scheme. 
3. Strengthening LPG supply chain – Around half of rural population has to travel faraway to procure LPG cylinder, urban slum pockets also face gaps in doorstep delivery. Plugging these loopholes is very important to boost timely availability of LPG for all households in all parts of country.  
4. Creating a new market for locally available biomass– Government needs to pilot initiatives that prevent use of biomass in decentralized processing units that process that manufacture briquettes and pellets. Similarly, households can be incentivized to supply locally available biomass like stubble, dung cakes to compressed bio-gas plants (CBG) set up under SATAT(sustainable alternative towards affordable transportation) scheme. This would enhance local income and livelihood opportunities and also will promote regular LPG use. 

Source- This post is based on the article “High LPG prices are scorching the air pollution fight” published in The Hindu on 9th Dec 2021.