Bottom-up Energy Models in Pakistan: Zooming into Enabling Conditions of Common Pool Resources

Abstract

Speaker: Najamul Saqib Memon, Institute of Sustainability Governance (INSUGO), Leuphana University Lüneburg The Russian attack on Ukraine has directly affected the global energy markets and its shocks are being felt across the globe, resulting in rising energy prices, inflation, and uncertainty across economies. In the case of Pakistan, with its heavy reliance on imported fossil fuels to produce electricity, there seems to be no alternative but to meet the growing energy demand of the country relying on indigenous renewable energy resources. Various studies have already highlighted the potential of Pakistan for solar photovoltaic (PV), wind, and hydropower projects. However, in reality, not much has been tapped. To tap the clean energy resources in off-grid regions, bottom-up energy models are one of the solutions to the problem of access to electricity. These models hold the potential to not only involve communities but also improve the energy poverty in far flung areas where grid expansion might be expensive due to geographical terrain. This paper aims at exploring and understanding different bottom-up energy models (in selected regions) in Pakistan. Methodologically the paper builds on data collected via semi-structured interviews in the field and desk research on the subject matter. The theoretical contribution of this paper is to test the “enabling conditions” (and also suggest) for successful community management known from the literature on Common Pool Resources (CPRs) (Agrawal, 2001; Ostrom, 1990; for applications in the energy sector see e.g., Maier, 2007; Gollwitzer et al., 2018).