A bird’s eye view of large tracts of red bare earth in Ukambani, a few kilometres east of Nairobi stretching through the Taru Desert to the shores of the Indian Ocean 500 kilometres away, shows the extent of deforestation in an already arid and water-stressed area.

It is a story replicated in most parts of Kenya and in Africa.

Yet, sacks of charcoal line the roads defiantly to be ferried to urban centres for cooking while Africa is denuded.

According to a recent study by the Institute of International Economic Development, biomass fuel such as wood and charcoal can help developing countries to move towards green economies in which the poor benefit from producing sustainable, clean energy.

The trick lies in using new technologies to convert wood to liquid and gaseous fuel or produce wood bundles or pellets that can be “gasified” to make electricity.

The report points out that reliance on biomass is set to triple from 10 per cent to 30 per cent of global energy consumption by 2050.

Developed nations such as India and China are taking this seriously and investing in new technology to capitalise on biomass fuels.

In Austria, 80 per cent of new homes are equipped with wood-pellet boilers.

Denmark plans to double its use of biomass energy in its bid to become carbon neutral by 2050.

In the UK planned biomass-to-electricity power stations would expand demand for biomass from one million tonnes to 50 million-60 million tonnes if all are built (5-6 times the available biomass resource in country).

Ironically developing nations, which are most dependent on biomass fuels are not investing enough in technology or research and consider biomass energy as traditional and dirty, a health hazard, poverty trap and threat to forests.

But the report shows how they can turn their already heavy biomass dependence into an advantage.

Biomass energy is highly flexible and can be readily converted into all the major energy carriers (heat, electricity, liquid and gas).

This means it can meet many of diverse energy needs from irrigation pumps and illumination, through agricultural processing and refrigeration to transport and telecommunication.

“Many governments in developing nations dissuade people from burning wood or charcoal as fuel as they think it is backward, but this just criminalises poor people for their energy needs and does little to limit deforestation,” says Duncan Macqueen, a senior researcher in IIED’s natural resources group and co-author of the report.

“Instead, governments should embrace and legalise biomass fuels as a source of energy and enact policies that make supply chains sustainable.”

The report shows that if nations manage their forests and ensure replanting happens in a way that is sensitive to food security needs, biomass can be a renewable and sustainable source of energy.

“If you manage the forest sustainably and only harvest the same amount that is grown each year then biomass energy will not lead to any loss of indigenous forest. Indeed biomass energy can be produced from indigenous forest without destroying it. Biogas can also be used to provide energy, reducing the need to collect fuel wood. But collecting fuel wood is not bad in itself as long as someone is planting new fuelwood,” says Macqueen.

Biomass also produces lower emissions of greenhouse gases than fossil fuels.

As biomass energy is labour intensive across the supply chain, it can offer employment options to reduce poverty, while the potential health hazards can be easily solved by better processing and stove technologies.

“Fossil fuels are running out and threatening our global climate in the process, so the hunt is on for greener more sustainable energy,” says co-author Sibel Korhaliller. “Developing nations that get serious about biomass energy and end any historic prejudices against such fuels will greatly serve their national interests. This will need a new approach that legalises and secures sustainable production by and for the millions of poor people who both produce and depend on biomass for energy.”

The report outlines ways for developing nations to enact policies to capitalise on the potential for biomass fuels to tackle climate change and poverty, and create energy security, jobs and sustainable economies.

Kenya’s case

According to Macqueen, biomass energy provides 68 per cent of Kenya’s national energy requirements and it is expected to remain the main source of energy for the foreseeable future.

He provides some interesting statistics: In 2000, Kenya was reported to use 34.3 million tonnes of biomass for fuel of which 15.1 million tonnes was in the form of fuelwood while 16.5 million tonnes was wood for charcoal processed in kilns with only 10 per cent efficiency.

Up to 43 per cent of the national consumption was from sustainable supplies while 57 per cent was from unsustainable supplies.

Of Kenya’s total land area of 57.6 million hectares, only six per cent (3,456,000ha) is forest cover and is estimated to be decreasing at the rate of 52,000ha (0.09 per cent) per year. In other words, in about 50 years, we may not have any forests to talk about.

In 1980, ninety-four per cent of all the wood harvested in the country was used for woodfuel, four per cent for poles and two per cent for timber.

By 1997, the proportions were estimated to be 90 per cent woodfuel, five per cent industrial feedstock and another five per cent poles and posts.

“Deforestation in Africa as elsewhere is a serious issue. It happens for two main reasons: People do not have legal rights over the forest and trees and so have no incentive to replant or manage the forest sustainably, instead, they poach trees and do not replant; two, people cannot make enough money legally from selling forest or tree products and so convert forests into agricultural land where they can make more money.

“So if people in Kenya lack policies that give them clear forest resource rights, then the biomass energy trade (fuel wood and charcoal) happens anyway by people poaching trees without replanting because they are not sure that they will be able to legally sell any trees they replant. With policies that do not encourage people to produce charcoal sustainably, the charcoal and fuel wood trade leads to deforestation,” the report says.

But, if government policies encourage people to plant and produce charcoal efficiently rather than criminalising it, charcoal and fuel wood can happen without deforestation.

Indeed, the energy produced would seriously cut emissions compared with fossil fuel alternatives because for each tree burnt, a new tree is planted that takes up the carbon that was emitted.

However, converting wood to biofuel is currently only being done in an experimental way and the technology is prohibitively expensive and not proven commercially.

But turning wood into electricity is much simpler. Macqueen explains that a wood gasifer is needed.

It heats wood to high temperature with controlled ventilation to turn it into a gas and then the gas is burned in a turbine to generate electricity.

The Energy and Resources Institute in India is leading research in technological options in biofuel.

Carry on with charcoal

At Rukinga Ranch in Tsavo West, an 80,000-acre wildlife sanctuary that until a decade ago was overgrazed and thin of forest, has delivered the world’s first voluntary carbon units Redd carbon credits (Redd is the acronym for reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation.

By protecting its forest cover, it can sell carbon credits on the international market.

One of its projects is to employ former poachers to make charcoal from trees that have been trimmed instead of cut down completely, hence saving the forests from destruction.

Using modern kilns that produce charcoal from nearly the whole lot, it also sells the charcoal cheaper — a one-kilo bag of charcoal sells for Ksh14 (US cents 17.5) versus the standard charcoal produced in inefficient kilns for Ksh25 (US cents 31).