Socio-economic impact of using roof top solar panels- a case study conducted in the rural areas of greater Sylhet, Bangladesh

Bangladesh is a developing country where the extension of the distribution grids to provide electricity to the remote rural area is not economically feasible. Photovoltaic (PV) based Solar Home System (SHS) works as an alternative for sparsely populated rural areas. In this paper, we explored the improvement in lifestyle and socio-economic development by introducing SHS in the rural area of Bangladesh. It enhanced the opportunities of small business owners to do more business, provided extra time for study and other works for the household members. Therefore, the SHS have both short term and long term impacts on the socio-economic growth. All the respondents of the survey expressed their satisfaction about SHSs.