THERMOCHEMICAL STUDY OF BIOMASS ENERGY

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING

Rural population of India depends on biomass energy for cooking, space heating and water heating. Though most of the energy needs in India is comes from fossil fuels, 70% of the rural population depends on the biomass-energy for their domestic usage in the country. About 65% of the Indian population lives in rural area where 70% of the primary energy need is supplied by bio-energy resources. Also, about 24% of the urban households depend on firewood, 20% on kerosene and 46% on LPG for cooking in India. Biomass energy resources are renewable energy and combustion would not produce poisonous gases and ash with sufficient oxygen supply. A village level study on the present scenario of domestic energy consumption will help to assess the demand and supply of bio-energy in the country. India is chosen for biomass energy assessment which has evergreen as well as moist and dry deciduous forest, where the majority of the people live in rural area or in semi urban area, mostly dependent on forest, agricultural and animal residues for domestic energy need. Biomass resources availability is computed based on the compilation of data on the area and productivity of agriculture, forests and horticulture crops. Sector-wise energy demand is computed based on the National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO study) data, primary survey data and from the literature. The ratio of biomass resource availability to demand gives the biomass resource status. The ratio greater than one indicates biomass resource surplus zones, while a ratio less than one indicates scarcity. The supply/demand ratio in the district ranges from less than 0.5 to more than 2. If the ratio is less than 1 (demand more than supply) then that is fuel wood deficit place and where the ratio is more than 1 (supply more than demand) then it is referred to as fuel wood surplus region.

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