Navigating the Indian Energy Trilemma: The Role of Liquefied Petroleum Gas

Executive Summary The energy trilemma, [1] which calls for optimising the competing needs of energy security, sustainability, and affordability, poses an acute challenge for India. Unprocessed biomass and fossil fuels accounted for over 90 percent of India’s primary energy basket in 2022 [2] and need to be reduced and eventually eliminated for long-term sustainability. For most of the Indian population, affordability is an important factor that often limits fuel choices. [3] Geopolitical tensions also threaten supply security and increase the price volatility of imported energy. Fuels such as liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), one of the cleanest conventional fuels currently available, is making a significant contribution to India’s progress on all three dimensions of the energy trilemma, especially in meeting household cooking fuel needs. [4] LPG is a clean cooking fuel with zero global warming potential (i.e., it is not a greenhouse gas as per the classification of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.) [5] LPG has the lowest supply and price risks among conventional fuels, and its modular nature makes it rapidly scalable, replaceable, and affordable. Indian households that switched from biomass to LPG saw a substantial reduction in indoor pollution and a consequent reduction in respiratory illness among women and children. [6] Reduced biomass gathering and cooking time as a result of LPG increased the scope for the education and employment for women, who are typically assigned by social norms to domestic chores. LPG adoption has also contributed to increasing energy-use efficiency, one of India’s commitments to the Paris Agreement; about 60 percent of the decline in India’s energy intensity in the last two decades has been attributed to the switch from biomass to LPG. [7] Continued policy push could enable LPG to play a more important role as a bridge fuel through complementing the use of natural gas to increase energy access, security, and sustainability.