Paper short abstract:

Based on research in rural eastern India, this paper explores the social politics around off-grid solar energy systems. It examines the ways in which these technologies can embody and reproduce wider social structures, such as those relating to caste, gender, religion and ethnicity.

Paper long abstract:

The widespread assumption of electricity access as a catalyst for modernity and development in rural India, combined with the heavily politicised absence of electricity grid connectivity in many areas, has opened a space in which decentralised energy technology has become perceived as the 'saviour' of remote villages. Off-grid energy, particularly solar energy, has become synonymous with developmental narratives promising 'self-sufficiency', 'sustainability' and 'empowerment'. Remote, often marginalised communities find themselves at the forefront of technological movements seeking to provide cleaner, smarter and more marketable energy to rural populations. However, decentralised energy cannot be separated from the society within which it is installed, used and governed.

This paper presents research drawing on fieldwork at one of India's first smart solar micro-grids, installed in a forest reserve in eastern India. It explores the ways in which both energy poverty and decentralised energy provision manifest wider societal hierarchies and power structures, particularly those relating to caste, gender, religion and ethnicity. This paper explores the biases and prejudices existing between rural and urbanite, often portrayed as between 'uneducated' and marginalised end-users and 'educated' technologists, as well as mainstream societal standards of what development is and how lives 'should' be lived. These relationships are materialised within energy projects and shape the experiences of those living on the periphery of social and political inclusion.