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PRWP

Reproducibility package for Using Price Incentives To Bound Welfare From Pay As You Go Solar Electricity

2026
Get Reproducibility Package
Reference ID
RR_AFR_2026_563
DOI
https://doi.org/10.60572/963w-dz52
Author(s)
Megan Lang
Collections
World Bank Policy Research Working Papers
Metadata
JSON
Created on
Feb 12, 2026
Last modified
Feb 18, 2026
  • Overview
  • Reproducibility Package
  • Description
  • Scope and coverage
  • Disclaimer
  • Access and rights
  • Contacts
  • Information on metadata
  • Citation

    • Overview

    Abstract

    Quantifying the welfare effects of rural electrification is often hindered by non-price barriers that depress demand at the adoption margin. I study demand for pas-as-you-go (PAYGo) solar using a randomized experiment with 800 existing PAYGo customers in Kenya and Rwanda post-adoption. The experiment randomly assigns incentives that lower the effective price of usage for consumers who meet monthly purchase thresholds. Although average demand is unresponsive, consumers with the highest pre-experimental demand increase their purchases by 6–7% in response to the incentive. I use these responses to estimate a lower bound on consumer surplus from PAYGo solar. Although I find large gains for high-demand consumers, benefits deteriorate substantially for low-demand consumers. Combining my estimates with evidence from the literature on the environmental externalities of solar home systems, I calculate that the marginal value of public funds of PAYGo solar subsidies is at most 1.7 in Kenya and 2 in Rwanda.

    Reproducibility Package

    Scripts
    Get Reproducibility Package
    File name
    RR_AFR_2026_563
    Zip package
    RR_AFR_2026_563.zip
    Title
    Reproducibility package for Using Price Incentives To Bound Welfare From Pay As You Go Solar Electricity
    Date
    2026-02
    Dependencies
    R dependencies are listed in the file renv.lock.
    Instructions
    See README in reproducibility package.
    Notes
    Computational reproducibility verified by Development Impact (DECDI) Analytics team, World Bank.
    Source code repository
    Repository name URI
    Reproducible Research Repository (World Bank) https://reproducibility.worldbank.org
    Software
    Name
    R
    Version
    4.5.2

    Reproducibility

    Technology environment

    Paper exhibits were reproduced on a computer with the following specifications:
    • OS: Windows 11 Enterprise
    • Processor: INTEL(R) XEON(R) PLATINUM 8562Y+ 2.80 GHz (4 processors)
    • Memory available: 32.0 GB
    Technology requirements

    Run time: ~ 90 minutes
    Reproduction instructions

    To reproduce the findings in this paper, a replicator must:

    1. Secure Access to Data: Access the datasets not included in the package. See subsection Datasets for more details.
    2. Download and Place Data: Once the data is accessed, users should place it in the appropriate folder.
    3. Run the Package: After placing the data in the folder, open the R project "Bounding PAYGo Welfare Replication" and run the script "Replication - Proprietary Data".

    Since all the data is not included, the package includes the results produced by replicators. These files can be used to review the results presented in the paper.

    Data

    Datasets
    Name
    Rwanda - Integrated Household Living Conditions Survey (EICV5)
    Note
    The EICV5 survey (Enquête Intégrale sur les Conditions de Vie des ménages) was conducted over a 12-month cycle from October 2016 to October 2017. Data collection was divided into 10 cycles in order to represent seasonality in the income and consumption data. Data accessed in April 2025. File location: Data/rwa-nisr-EICV5-data_STATA. Files: cs_S0_S5_Household.dta; cs_S1_S2_S3_S4_S6A_S6E_Person.dta; cs_S8A3_expenditure.dta; cs_S8B_expenditure.dta
    Access policy
    Data is publicly available but does not allow redistribution and it is not included in the reproducibility package.
    License URL
    https://microdata.statistics.gov.rw/index.php/catalog/82/study-description#page=accesspolicy&tab=study-desc
    Data URL
    https://microdata.statistics.gov.rw/index.php/catalog/82
    Citation
    National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda (December 2017). “Integrated Household Living Conditions Survey(2016-2017), Version 0.1 of the public use dataset”. provided by the National Data Archive.
    Name
    Kenya Integrated Household Budget Survey 2015-2016
    Note
    The 2015/16 Kenya Integrated Household Budget Survey (KIHBS) was conducted over a 12-month period to obtain up-to-date data on a range of socioeconomic indicators used to monitor the implementation of development initiatives. Data accessed in April 2025. File location: Data/KIHBS. Files: Consumption_aggregate.dta; Energy_use.dta
    Access policy
    Data is publicly available but does not allow redistribution and it is not included in the reproducibility package.
    License URL
    https://statistics.knbs.or.ke/nada/index.php/catalog/13/study-description#metadata-data_access
    Data URL
    https://statistics.knbs.or.ke/nada/index.php/catalog/13
    Citation
    Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (2016). “Kenya Integrated Household Budget Survey 2015-2016”. Provided by the Kenya National Data Archive.
    Name
    Phone Survey Data
    Note
    Data from a phone survey conducted with BBOXX customers who were part of the experiment in winter 2019. The anonymized version of this survey can be downloaded at the link below. Data accessed in April 2019. Files: Data/phone_survey.csv
    Access policy
    Data is publicly available and included in the reproducibility package.
    License
    CC0 1.0 Universal
    License URL
    https://dataverse.harvard.edu/dataset.xhtml?persistentId=doi:10.7910/DVN/ATY3PU
    Data URL
    https://dataverse.harvard.edu/dataset.xhtml?persistentId=doi:10.7910/DVN/ATY3PU
    Citation
    Lang, Megan. 2025. “Partial Replication Data for 'The Role of Market Frictions in Demand for Prepaid Electricity';” Harvard Dataverse. https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/ATY3PU
    Name
    BBOXX Ltd. Administrative Customer-Level Data (2018–2019)
    Note
    Customer-level data on system size adopted, date of adoption, who was offered the price incentives, and all customer payments in the study period. These data start in March, 2018 and continue through February, 2019. The customer-level data is proprietary and can only be obtained by signing a data sharing agreement with BBOXX Ltd. Data accessed in March 2019. File location: Data. Files: Final_90days.csv; ipa_bboxx.csv; IPA_IDs.csv; KE_Monthly.Rda; KE_Pmts.Rda; raw_kenya_large.csv; raw_rwanda_large.csv; RW_Monthly.Rda; RW_Pmts.Rda; use.Rda; weights2.csv; weights2_Kenya.csv
    Access policy
    Data access was granted directly to the study authors by the data owners/managers. It was obtained with a custom data license that does not allow for redistribution and it is not included in the reproducibility package.
    Citation
    BBOXX Ltd. 2019. Administrative Customer-Level Data on System Adoption, Pricing Incentives, and Payments (March 2018–February 2019) [dataset].
    Data statement

    Some data is restricted and has not been included in the reproducibility package. For more details, please refer to the README file.

    Description

    Output
    Type
    Working Paper
    Title
    Using Price Incentives To Bound Welfare From Pay As You Go Solar Electricity
    Description
    Policy Research Working Papers (PRWP)
    Authors
    Author Affiliation Email
    Megan Lang World Bank mlang@worldbank.org
    Date of production

    2026-02-12

    Scope and coverage

    Geographic locations
    Location Code
    Africa AFR
    Keywords
    Electricity Access Welfare Solar
    Topics
    ID Topic Parent topic ID Vocabulary Vocabulary URI
    D1 Household Behavior and Family Economics D Journal of Economic Literature (JEL)
    D6 Welfare Economics D Journal of Economic Literature (JEL)
    H2 Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue H Journal of Economic Literature (JEL)
    O2 Development Planning and Policy O Journal of Economic Literature (JEL)
    Q4 Energy Q Journal of Economic Literature (JEL)

    Disclaimer

    Disclaimer

    The materials in the reproducibility packages are distributed as they were prepared by the staff of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/The World Bank. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this event do not necessarily reflect the views of the World Bank, the Executive Directors of the World Bank, or the governments they represent. The World Bank does not guarantee the accuracy of the materials included in the reproducibility package.

    Access and rights

    License
    Name URI
    Modified BSD3 https://opensource.org/license/bsd-3-clause/

    Contacts

    Contacts
    Name Affiliation Email
    Megan Lang World Bank mlang@worldbank.org
    Reproducibility WBG World Bank reproducibility@worldbank.org

    Information on metadata

    Producers
    Name Abbreviation Affiliation Role
    Reproducibility WBG DECDI World Bank - Development Impact Department Verification and preparation of metadata
    Date of Production

    2026-02-12
    Document version

    1

    Citation

    Citation
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