Analysis of socio-economic impact of mini-Grids for rural area development in Rwanda. Case of Mukungu mini-hydropower plant

Abstract

Rwanda’s hydropower sector has made a tremendous progress over the last decades. The total installed capacity of power is around 235.6 MW with hydropower contributing to 50.5 percent. Overall country's renewable energy consumption still having the low developed potentials, particularly in hydropower (300MW through micro generation but also the inter-boundary with Burundi and DRC, 145MW at Rusizi III, and with Burundi and Tanzania, 90MW at Rusumo fall), as well as geothermal between 170MW and 340MW, peat up to 1200MW, and solar 66.8Twh. The purpose of the study was to analyze the socio economic impact of that accessibility of electricity from off grid of rural area. Geographically the study was conducted in Mukungu village, Rwariro cell, Gitesi sector, Karongi District, in Western Province of Rwanda. The quantitative data were collected from 128 sampled respondents using a questionnaire. To avoid errors that can arise during data entry and minimize the time that was expected for data entry, the Computer Assisted Personal Interview (CAPI) was used. The questionnaire was developed, coded, and deployed across Kobbo toolbox server, an open-source tool for mobile data collection. The questionnaire was then deployed to the tablets of the enumerators. The study used a descriptive statistics, quantitative research design to explain, and comprehend the causal relationship between the study variables in education, health, and employment opportunities, as well as the country's power provision. Using SPSS, the dataset was analyzed and produce the output, and then the syntax has been saved for further reuse. The outcomes of the study showing that 80.5 percent of the respondents who have the access to Mukungu hydro-power plant agreed that the existence of minigrid power plant has improved the employment sector while 87.6 percent improved the education sector. This relationship is statistically significant with Pearson Chi-Square of 13.666 and Asymptotic Significance (2-sided) of 0.000 which is lower than 0.5. The study recommends that the roadmap must be built upon by public actors (government and/or regulators) who must develop a clear and conducive policy environment that permits it to be implemented. This entails developing guidelines for the rules, conditions, and standards under which mini-grids should be developed and operated, such as licensing regimes, tariff regulation, subsidy and cross-subsidy schemes, power-purchase agreements, grid extension and integration uncertainty, environmental mandates, and access to finance.