Desta Getnet Alemu, Melka Yoseph, Sime Getachew, Yirga Fikadu, Marie Mequannt, Haile Mebrahtu
Natural Resource Management Program, Oda Bultum University, Ethiopia.
Natural Resources Economics and Policy Program, Wondo Genet College of Forestry and Natural Resources, Hawassa University, Ethiopia.
Heliyon. 2020 Oct 16;6(10):e04791. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2020.e04791. eCollection 2020 Oct.
Most rural communities in developing countries, rely heavily on traditional biomass for cooking and lighting. Furthermore, a large area of forest land has been changed to other land-use types like agricultural land is becoming a serious problem in Wondo Genet district. This situation largely contributed to deforestation and forest degradation. Hence, assessing the efficiency of adopting an alternative source of energy was found to be very important. This study was carried out to examine the role of biogas technology in fuelwood saving and carbon emission reduction in Wondo Genet district, southern Ethiopia. The multi-stage sampling procedure was followed to select sample households. A total of 152 households (54 adopters and 98 non-adopters) were involved in the household survey. Moreover, 25 test subjects were taken randomly from both adoption categories to conduct Kitchen Performance Test. Descriptive statistics and independent-sample t-test were used to analyze the data. Results showed that the major fuel sources for domestic use were plantation forest, natural forest, crop residue, and animal dung, accounting 46.71 %, 30.92 %, 15.13 %, and 7.24 %, respectively. Among the 54 sampled biogas plants, 32 (59.26 %) were a digester size of 6 m whereas the remaining 22 (40.74 %) were of 8 m. The annual fuelwood saving potential of the technology was found to be 1423.06 kg with an emission reduction potential of 2.1 tons of CO e per biogas plant annually. Accordingly, all functional biogas plants were estimated to reduce about 91.63 tons of carbon emission annually. Generally, the biogas was found to be a promising technology in combating the pressure on forest resources and mitigating climate change. Therefore, the energy sector of the country should encourage households to adopt biogas plants that have more than 8 m digester size to improve the fuelwood and carbon emission reduction potential.
发展中国家的大多数农村社区严重依赖传统生物质用于烹饪和照明。此外，在翁多杰内特区，大面积的林地已转变为其他土地利用类型，如农业用地，这正成为一个严重问题。这种情况在很大程度上导致了森林砍伐和森林退化。因此，评估采用替代能源的效率被认为非常重要。本研究旨在考察沼气技术在埃塞俄比亚南部翁多杰内特区节约薪柴和减少碳排放方面的作用。采用多阶段抽样程序选择样本家庭。共有152户家庭（54户采用者和98户非采用者）参与了家庭调查。此外，从两个采用类别中随机抽取25名测试对象进行厨房性能测试。使用描述性统计和独立样本t检验来分析数据。结果表明，家庭使用的主要燃料来源是人工林、天然林、作物残渣和动物粪便，分别占46.71%、30.92%、15.13%和7.24%。在54个抽样的沼气厂中，32个（59.26%）沼气池大小为6立方米，其余22个（40.74%）为8立方米。该技术每年的薪柴节约潜力为1423.06千克，每个沼气厂每年的减排潜力为2.1吨二氧化碳当量。据此，所有正常运行的沼气厂估计每年可减少约91.63吨碳排放。总体而言，沼气被认为是应对森林资源压力和缓解气候变化的一项有前景的技术。因此，该国能源部门应鼓励家庭采用沼气池大小超过8立方米的沼气厂，以提高薪柴节约和碳排放减少潜力。
