Why Millions of Indian Households Still Cook With Firewood Despite Free LPG

In the rural districts of Eastern Uttar Pradesh, one of India’s most densely populated and economically disadvantaged regions, the kitchen has become an unlikely battleground for public health, gender equity, and climate policy. A comprehensive review published in Discover Sustainability by Manokamana Ram, Sandeep Tiwari, and Sunil Kumar of Banaras Hindu University examines why, despite a decade of aggressive policy intervention, millions of households continue to burn firewood, cow dung cakes, and agricultural residues to cook their meals. The answer, the authors argue, is not simply a matter of distributing more gas cylinders. It is a tangled web of economics, infrastructure, psychology, and culture that no single subsidy can untangle on its own.

The scale of the problem is staggering. According to the International Energy Agency, more than 600 million Indians still relied on solid biomass for cooking as of the late 2010s. The World Health Organization attributes over 500,000 premature deaths in India each year to indoor air pollution generated by conventional cooking practices, with the burden falling disproportionately on women and children, who spend the most time near the cooking fire. Burning biomass releases high concentrations of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and carbon monoxide, pollutants empirically linked to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, acute lower respiratory infections, cataracts, cardiovascular disorders, and adverse pregnancy outcomes. In households that depend on traditional fuels, medical expenses run 25 to 30 percent higher than among liquefied petroleum gas users, according to research cited in the review, creating a punishing feedback loop in which poverty produces illness and illness deepens poverty.

India’s flagship response, the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana, launched in 2016, has been genuinely transformative in one narrow sense: it provided free LPG connections to more than 80 million low-income households nationwide. But the review synthesizes evidence showing that connection coverage and sustained usage are two very different things. One long-term evaluation tracking users over four years found that while connection coverage exceeded 90 percent, consistent usage remained below 60 percent. Fewer than 30 percent of beneficiary families refill their cylinders more than three times a year. The reason is brutally simple arithmetic: a refill costs between 950 and 1,100 rupees, a sum that is prohibitive for Below Poverty Line households and marginal farmers whose incomes are seasonal and irregular. When cash runs short, families revert to biomass that is effectively free for the gathering.

This pattern has forced researchers to rethink a foundational model of energy behavior. The classic energy ladder theory holds that households ascend linearly from biomass to modern fuels as income and education rise. But in Eastern Uttar Pradesh, the data tell a different story, one better captured by the energy stacking model. Households routinely use multiple fuels simultaneously, reserving LPG for special occasions or months when cash is plentiful and returning to firewood during lean agricultural seasons. The review’s authors propose an Integrated Energy Behavior Model in which economic capacity, infrastructure access, and behavioral preference jointly shape fuel decisions. Fuel stacking, they suggest, is not resistance to modernity but a rational adaptation to uncertain incomes, and policy frameworks that assume linear switching systematically misread rural economic reality.

Infrastructure compounds the problem. Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas data indicate that nearly 40 percent of villages in the region lack a functional LPG distribution center, and some rural beneficiaries must travel more than 10 kilometers to collect a cylinder. Weak subsidy targeting, delayed reimbursements, and sparse distributor density mean that rural households face longer travel distances and reduced refill frequency compared with their urban counterparts. The urban-rural divide is stark: around 70 percent of urban households in the region report using LPG or electricity as their primary cooking fuel, compared with only 30 percent of rural households. Comparative evidence suggests this is not inevitable, as states like Odisha and West Bengal achieve higher refill consistency through denser supply networks and more active community participation.

Perhaps the most surprising findings concern psychology and culture rather than money. Ethnographic fieldwork in rural Uttar Pradesh revealed that fear of gas leaks, memories of past accidents, and misinformation lead many households to keep firewood as their daily fuel while treating LPG as a ceremonial luxury. A 2018 NITI Aayog survey found that 28 percent of women worried about LPG safety, while 35 percent believed food cooked over a wood fire simply tastes better. Older family members sometimes discourage LPG use out of unfamiliarity or distrust of modern equipment. The review emphasizes that top-down safety messaging often fails against these deeply held convictions, and that trust-building interventions such as participatory demonstrations, women-led safety workshops, and peer mentoring measurably improve user confidence and refill regularity.

Education, particularly female literacy, emerges as one of the most powerful levers for change. Analysis of the India Human Development Survey shows that families with literate women are 2.5 times more likely to use clean fuels than households with no female education. Multilevel regression modeling confirms that literate women better perceive health risks, engage more effectively with subsidy schemes, and are more likely to participate in non-farm employment, which improves affordability. Time-use research adds another dimension: switching from biomass to LPG saves an average of 90 minutes of cooking time daily, time that flows into income-generating activities and children’s education, generating measurable economic uplift over just two years. Clean cooking, in other words, is not merely an energy intervention but a livelihood and gender-equity intervention.

The review also frames the issue as a climate opportunity with quantifiable co-benefits. Households dependent on firewood and dung cakes contribute significantly to carbon dioxide and PM2.5 emissions compared with LPG or electricity users, and longitudinal assessments show substantial reductions in indoor pollutants following exclusive LPG adoption. At the macro level, widespread biomass replacement could yield significant carbon emission reductions, positioning clean cooking as a strategic climate action pathway. The authors suggest that integrating health verification and carbon finance mechanisms into policy design could amplify both local and global sustainability outcomes, turning kitchen transitions into fundable climate projects.

What the authors ultimately call for is a second generation of clean cooking policy, one that moves beyond connection-centric metrics to usage-based indicators. Their recommendations include targeted refill subsidies responsive to agricultural income cycles, community-level bulk refill centers, last-mile delivery reforms, behavioral change communication embedded in the policy framework, and linkages between clean cooking initiatives and rural credit, health insurance, and women’s education programs. They acknowledge a key limitation: district-level data for Eastern Uttar Pradesh remain scarce, forcing reliance on comparable regional studies, and they call for longitudinal household surveys to evaluate long-term behavioral and economic impacts. The core message, however, is unambiguous. Free cylinders opened a door, but affordability, trust, infrastructure, and women’s agency determine whether families actually walk through it. Until policy addresses all four simultaneously, the smoke will keep rising over the kitchens of Eastern Uttar Pradesh.

Subject of Research: Household cooking fuel choices and their health and economic implications in Eastern Uttar Pradesh, India

Article Title: Household cooking fuel choices and their health-economic implications in Eastern Uttar Pradesh: a comprehensive review

Article References: Household cooking fuel choices and their health-economic implications in Eastern Uttar Pradesh: a comprehensive review. (n.d.). https://doi.org/10.1007/s43621-025-02334-y

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1007/s43621-025-02334-y

Keywords: clean cooking, LPG adoption, household air pollution, Eastern Uttar Pradesh, Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana, biomass fuels, energy stacking, fuel stacking, women's health, energy poverty, PM2.5 exposure, energy policy