I recently published a piece about SDG 7 and the objective of 'sustainable energy for all' in the context of Bangladesh. This piece and its lessons learned very much speak to the overall South East Asian and African contexts through the key policy insights and how to drive energy access forward to all rural areas.

Abstract:
After decades of growth, the Bangladesh Solar Home Systems (SHS) programme, the world’s largest domestic solar off-grid electrification scheme which has frequently been heralded as a model for other developing countries, is in danger of collapsing as end user support and installation levels have plummeted. This paper explores the reasons behind this development, tracing the programme run by the Infrastructure Development Company Limited (IDCOL) from its early expansion employing pioneering partnership and financing models, to its more recent decline. It finds that the government’s simultaneous implementation of several competing on- and off-grid energy access projects and lack of regulatory oversight alongside significant subsidy decreases which made SHS uncompetitive, led customers to abandon the programme. This, in turn, is putting at risk Bangladesh’s objective of achieving Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 7 – affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all – by 2030.

Please find the article here in an open-access format:

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14693062.2022.2056118