In the forested highlands along the Mekong River, 55-year-old Kha Sros piles bundles of firewood in the kitchen of her wooden house. This wood, chopped from dwindling forest patches, has become a household necessity.
“Without firewood, we cannot cook. Gas stoves are expensive and I cannot afford them,” says Sros, who belongs to the Indigenous Kuy community. “If we could afford a gas stove or electricity to cook, we would [buy them].”
Sros and hundreds of other families in her village are among the 80% of households in rural Cambodia for whom firewood is still the primary cooking fuel, according to the Cambodia Development Resource Institute.
She lives in Tonsaong, a village in Cambodia’s north-eastern Stung Treng province. Located roughly 35 kilometers south of the namesake provincial capital, it is connected by unpaved, rough‑terrain roads and narrow paths that make travel difficult, especially in the rainy season.
Cambodia had electrified 99% of its 14,000 villages by 2024, from 24% in 2009, according to figures from the Ministry of Mines and Energy. But in rural areas, some have not experienced the benefits of this progress. Though grid infrastructure reached Tonsaong last year, many residents cannot afford to connect to it or buy electricity from it.
In Cambodia, the cost of grid expansion is shouldered by a pipeline of stakeholders, including international financiers such as the World Bank, Export-Import Bank of China and Asian Development Bank, who provide loans or grants largely through the state utility Electricite du Cambodge; and rural electricity enterprises that invest in and operate distribution networks connected to the national grid.
Such financing of Cambodia’s grid infrastructure has expanded its capacity and reach. But for many rural consumers like Sros, whose incomes are often far lower than people from urban areas, the connection fees, materials and labour costs of wiring their homes has been prohibitive.
Electrification has proven too costly to take up, leaving them having to rely primarily on firewood which threatens their health. While the government has promoted renewable-energy-powered stopgap measures and loans for grid connection, these have also proven expensive and insufficient for the rural poor.
Solar stopgap
The government launched several initiatives to try and bring electricity to rural households. These included the “Power to the Poor” programme, in 2013, providing interest-free loans to help cover the costs of grid connection.
Also in 2013, the government launched the Solar Home Systems programme, to bring standalone solar photovoltaic systems to homes, which can provide electricity for lighting and basic appliances.
Under the programme, the government partially subsidises the materials and installation of systems for off-grid rural households, with consumers paying the remaining costs over four years.
But even with these initiatives, electrification can still feel beyond reach for remote rural households – many of whom worry they cannot afford the upfront connection costs or monthly electricity fees, notes a 2025 World Development paper.
At the same time, the small-scale solar home systems that poorer households can afford often barely cover their power needs due to limited panel and battery capacity.
Sros owns a 50-watt solar home system. She says the upfront costs of installing it were so high that she had to pay for it in instalments over five years. The system only allows her to charge her phone and use three small lightbulbs. The system’s battery has also aged and become less efficient, she adds.
This means she must make sacrifices, such as foregoing cooling during hot days. “It is hot now. I am sweating. I have a ceiling fan but my old battery cannot generate enough power. I can only light up one LED at night because I need to save this energy,” Sros says.
“But even a [replacement] 5 Amp-hour battery costs me around 50 USD. How can I afford it?”
Sros possesses around three hectares of farmland, where her children grow rice, cashew and cassava. The family’s income is unstable and limited because crop prices have fallen while production costs such as fertiliser and pesticides remain high.
“I cannot afford national grid connectivity. I have not [even] asked the supplier of the electricity because I do not have any money,” she says.
Giuseppina Siciliano, a lecturer in sustainable development at SOAS University of London and co-author of the World Development paper, highlights that solar home systems’ effectiveness is often limited by variable solar availability, constrained battery storage and affordability challenges.
“Reliance on a single energy source is often insufficient,” she tells Dialogue Earth, adding that support for diversified energy use – such as combining solar with gasoline for diesel generators or micro-hydro – is essential.
Life without power
For residents of Tonsaong, electrification is also directly linked to their health. Hiem Sao is a farmer in the village who is unable to afford grid connection. “We need to pay for petrol, seeds, pesticides and more,” Sao notes, adding that after harvest, there is not money left. “This year cashew trees did not yield much fruit, so many farmers lost their income.”
Like Sros, Sao uses a three-stone stove, a basic open fire setup used by many poorer households to cook, and relies on fuels like firewood, manure or crop residue. But this poses serious health risks.
Reliance on firewood drives household air pollution, which according to the World Health Organization (WHO) is linked to health problems such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, lung cancer, cardiovascular disease and stroke in adults. Children face pneumonia and asthma, while pregnant people face dangers including low birth weight and stillbirth.
About two million rural Cambodian households still cook with solid fuels, exposing mainly women and children to harmful smoke. Household air pollution is linked to an estimated 14,000 deaths in Cambodia each year – about 15% of all deaths in the country, according to the WHO – highlighting the urgent need to reduce reliance on firewood.
Siciliano emphasises that energy justice challenges arise when vulnerable groups, such as women-headed households, are overlooked in policy design, deepening marginalisation and limiting access to energy services.
“Strengthening community-level governance can promote more equitable energy distribution and foster inclusive decision-making,” Siciliano says. “In this context, village-level committees can play an important role in identifying diverse vulnerabilities and ensuring that energy interventions are better tailored to local needs.”
In the meantime, villagers in Tonsaong continue to gather firewood for their energy needs. Sao imagines a future with reliable access to electricity: one where time is no longer spent gathering firewood, where students can study more comfortably, it is easier for small businesses to operate, and daily life made safer in Cambodia’s remote villages.
“With the national grid reaching the village, people want to connect to it. But only a few households can afford it,” Sao says. “People do not want to use solar [home systems] because it cannot generate enough [electricity].
“I wish the price was cheaper so poor households can afford the grid.”
