Environmental Valuation & Cost-Benefit News

A better life for two million households in Africa through implementation of domestic biogas plants was the ambitious target set at a May 2007 conference in Nairobi, Kenya, organized by the Biogas Africa Initiative. A national programme has already been started in Rwanda, while 10 other countries have started preparations.

Unlike Asia, experience with domestic biogas in African countries has been ambiguous. An analysis undertaken by Tinashe Nhete and Christopher Kellner1 reveals that the exact number of plants installed in Africa is not known but that most units were installed in Tanzania (more than 4000), Kenya and Ethiopia, with hundreds to only a few in other countries. Unfortunately, an estimated 60% of these plants failed to stay in operation. However, other plants succeeded in providing the users with benefits over a number of years and gave evidence on the reliability of the technology if properly deployed.
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Felix ter Heegde and Kai Sonder made a first assessment on the potential of, and need for, domestic biogas in Africa. The technical potential was defined as the number of households that can meet the two basic requirements - sufficient availability of dung and water to run a biogas installation. Although biogas can be generated from a score of organic materials, in Africa cattle dung from husbandry is best suited to feeding a domestic installation. Biogas can substitute traditional cooking fuels such as wood fuel and charcoal but needs to be produced at a minimum amount of 0.8-1 m3 daily. To generate this amount of biogas, the household should have 20-30 kg of fresh dung available on a daily basis. For large parts of Africa, zero grazing is not common, and cattle are generally small and undernourished. Therefore most African households would need at least three or four night-stabled heads of cattle to collect sufficient dung. Where cattle urine cannot be collected, the dung has to be mixed with equal amounts of water to enable both the installation’s microbiological process as well as the hydraulic functioning.
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Taking certain other assumptions into account, the technical potential market for domestic biogas in Africa is estimated at 18.5 million households.
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Felix ter Heegde and Kai Sonder calculated a biogas feasibility index (BFI). This index assesses values within an aspect area relative to each other, not unlike the calculation method of the human development index (HDI). From these BFIs, it can be concluded that the need for biogas in Africa, in terms of its potential contribution to development, energy, health and sanitation, and environment, is very great.
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Winrock International conducted a financial and economic cost-benefit analysis of an integrated domestic biogas, latrine and hygiene programme in sub-Saharan Africa....

For the sub-Saharan Africa programme, the financial rate of return was estimated at 7.5% and the economic internal rate of return dramatically higher, at 178%. The difference between these returns reflects the nature of the intervention. An integrated biogas and latrine programme involves significant capital investment and generates expenditure savings (rather than income) while yielding a wide range of economic (rather than financial) benefits, such as improved health, increased availability of potent organic fertilisers, time savings through the reduced drudgery associated with fuel collection, and environmental benefits. The multifaceted nature of these economic benefits has the potential to make progress simultaneously on a number of Millennium Development Goals, thereby significantly improving the lives of rural African households. Women and children in particular have the potential to be the greatest beneficiaries. They disproportionately endure the drudgery of fuel collection and the negative health effects associated with spending hours breathing highly polluted air just to prepare food for their families.

The specific targets of the initiative to be achieved by 2020 include:
* two million biogas plants installed (90% operation rate)
* 10 million Africans benefiting in daily life from the plants
* 800 private biogas companies and 200 biogas appliance manufacturing workshops involved or established
* 100,000 new jobs created
* comprehensive quality standards and quality control systems developed and in use
* one million toilets constructed and attached to the biogas plant
* 80% of the bio-slurry used as organic fertilizer
* agricultural production raised by up to 25%
* health and living conditions of women and children improved, and the deaths of women and children reduced by 5000 each year
* drudgery reduced by saving 2-3 hours per household each day in fetching wood, cooking and cleaning the pots
* health costs saved of up to US$80-125 per family, per year
* 3-4 million tonnes of wood saved per year
* greenhouse gas emissions annually reduced by 10 Mtonnes of CO2 equivalent.

The total financing required is $2 billion, out of which $800 million is to be expected from public funding (national and donors) and the sale of carbon credits. For the latter, the Initiative developed a proposal for a new methodology specifically aiming at the trading of emission reductions from household digesters.

The most appropriate biogas technology for the country may be selected. The use of a single design in suitable sizes and the standardization of all products is required.
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The cost of a biogas plant is relatively high for the majority of households in Africa, even for many of those that have cattle. To be able to develop a sustainable market, the national programmes will use a combination of own contribution of the households in cash and labour, credits to households, and subsidy.
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Useful biogas websites can be found at:
www.biogasafrica.org (Biogas Africa Initiative)
www.bspnepal.org.np (Nepal)
www.biogas.org.vn (Vietnam)
www.idcol.org (Bangladesh)
www.nbp.org.kh (Cambodia)
www.snvworld.org (SNV, click ‘practise areas/biogas’)

by Wim J. van Nes 1 and Tinashe D. Nhete 2
1. Biogas Practice Leader of the Netherlands Development Organisation (SNV); e-mail: wvannes@snvworld.org
2. Programme Team Leader for Infrastructure Services of Practical Action Southern Africa; e-mail: tinashen@practicalaction.org.zw

Renewable Energy World Magazine www.renewable-energy-world.com
http://www.renewable-energy-world.com/display_article/305278/121/CRTIS/none/none/Biogas-for-a-better-life:-An-African-initiative/