India has achieved near-universal coverage of cooking gas connections, but millions of households are not using them. The disconnect between infrastructure and actual consumption reveals a deeper crisis in the country’s clean cooking program.
PNG connections almost doubled over the past four years, yet gas consumption in the residential sector increased by only 26% in the same period, according to a report by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis.
The numbers tell a stark story. Between FY2020-21 and FY2024-25, domestic PNG connections doubled from 7.8 million to 15 million. Gas consumption, however, only rose from 2.63 million metric standard cubic meters per day to 3.35 mmscmd.
“This connection consumption mismatch could mean that, at present, many households with a PNG connection are using other fuel sources like LPG or electric cooking,” the report said.
The Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana has provided 103 million deposit-free LPG connections to below poverty line households since 2016. Total LPG connections increased from 200 million in FY2015-16 to 330 million in FY2024-25, an increase of 65% over a decade.
But consumption has not kept pace. PMUY customers’ annual per capita consumption remains at 4.47 cylinder refills, well below the estimated average of 6.64 cylinder refills by non-PMUY households. This means PMUY beneficiaries use only 65% of the estimated annual consumption of regular households and 54% of the estimated annual requirement of eight cylinders.
“The recent provision of subsidies to the PMUY customers resulted in a remarkable improvement in the per capita consumption of LPG from 3 refills in FY2019-20 to 4.47 refills in FY2024-25, showing that the increase in connections and consumption of LPG will be subsidy-linked,” the report said.
The urban-rural divide is sharp. Use of clean cooking fuels in urban areas increased from around 89% to 93% between FY2018-19 and FY2022-23. In rural areas, it remained at around 50% in the same period.
Almost 40% of households still depend on polluting solid fuels like firewood, animal dung and charcoal for their cooking needs, according to the National Family Health Survey 2019-21.
PNG prices provide another explanation. In the period when connections doubled, PNG prices went up by 48% from Rs 33 per standard cubic meter to Rs 48.59 per scm.
The infrastructure tells the same story of underutilization. Six out of seven LNG terminals operational in FY2024-25 operated at below 50% capacity. The capacity-weighted average utilisation rate of major gas pipelines is only 41%, according to the report.
LPG infrastructure growth has been moderate. The year-on-year increase in both bottling plants and distributors has fallen to below 1% over the past few years. The total bottling capacity increased by 25% between FY2018-19 to FY2024-25, while the total number of distributors increased by about 7% in the same period.
A calculation reveals a significant gap. The current bottling capacity can support about 1.6 billion cylinders annually. But if all 330 million households with LPG connections consume LPG as primary fuel at eight refills per household per year, the total requirement would be 2.6 billion cylinders. This means the annual capacity will fall short by almost 38% for household needs, even before considering any consumption by industries.
“This also indicates the shortfall in demand in LPG consumption in India despite connections due to affordability concerns, impacting expansion of infrastructure,” the report said.
LPG and PNG connections together have a coverage of 115% of households in the country as of FY2024-25. Yet consumption remains limited, pointing to affordability as the core barrier despite massive infrastructure investment.
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