Is biofuel the solution to our energy problem?
Feb 08, 2008
The current Kenyan crisis has Ugandan urbanites biting their nails in anxiety about the rising fuel prices. Yet, this crisis is merely swelling a boil we have always had.
By Lydia Namubiru
The current Kenyan crisis has Ugandan urbanites biting their nails in anxiety about the rising fuel prices. Yet, this crisis is merely swelling a boil we have always had.
Erratic and steep fuel prices are the nemesis of nearly every sub-Saharan African country. For instance, pump prices in Uganda exceed those in Australia by more than 50% even on a good day.
Yet, we can literally grow fuel in our backyards by planting crops like jatropha, maize, sugarcane, soya beans and others from which biofuel can be extracted.
Biofuel, which is fuel extracted from agricultural produce, can be produced either as biodiesel, which is extracted from vegetable seeds or as bioethanol from starch and sugar plants. Biodiesel is used to run diesel engines while bioethanol runs petrol engines. Ethanol converted into ethanol gel is used for cooking and lighting.
Uganda has the capacity to produce substantial amounts of biodiesel and small amounts of ethanol are already being produced as a by product of sugar factories.
The ministry of energy estimates that if the production of biofuel is encouraged, Uganda will be able to reduce her diesel and petrol imports by 10,000 tonnes a year.
Biofuel is already available on the Ugandan market for cooking and lighting lamps, under the trade name Liquifire.
According to the new renewable energy policy, oil companies will be compelled to blend their fuel imports with up to 20% biofuels.
Some companies in Uganda have already invested in the biofuel technology. VEDCO, a Wobulenzi- based agricultural community organisation, started producing biodiesel for their rice miller in August 2006. They are now running their rice mill on biodiesel only.
“What we are doing here is a pilot project but we are looking to extend the technology to the farmers in the villages,†said Dan Kisitu, an assistant project manager with VEDCO.
Royal Van Zanten, a local flower farm, has also sunk close to sh160m into the technology. Last year, the company produced 3,000 litres of fuel from about 9,000kg of jatropha seeds bought from vanilla farmers who usually grow jatropha as support plants for the vanilla.
In the countryside, locals are reportedly already adding enguuli (local gin) to petrol to run vehicles
Other African countries are also eager to turn farm fields into oil fields. Nigeria, is currently making ethanol from cassava, Malawi is producing sugarcane ethanol and so is Mozambique. Nigeria aims at producing cassava ethanol worth over $150m every year, while the government of Mozambique has set aside over US$700m for biofuel research, production and promotion, according to the Science and Development Network, an international web- based information agency on the role of science in development.
This haste to invest in and encourage biofuels is driven by a number of factors including concerns about total dependence on imported and expensive fossil fuels, pollution being caused by emissions from fossil fuels, the need to conserve the already depleting oil reserves as well as other relative advantages that biofuels have over their fossil counterparts.
“It is in our interest to diversify the energy mix in order to reduce dependence,†Daudi Migereko, the energy minister, told journalists last year.
Currently, Uganda needs close to 840 million litres of fuel annually, all of which must be imported.The prices of these imports are unpredictable and very high. If the 20% blending target is achieved, about 168 million litres of fuel would be homegrown.
Being an agro economy, Uganda will be able to use her agricultural produce, including wild waste plants, more profitably - for energy production. “Before we started making biofuel, jatropha was a waste plant here but now farmers are earning at least sh200 for every kilo of jatropha seeds,†Kisutu of VEDCO points at the advantages of biofuel production to local farmers.
Biofuels if produced with very efficient methods are also seen as cheaper than fossil fuels especially for agro communities like Uganda.
As long as a barrel of oil is more than $35, biofuel as an alternative is an economically more viable option, according to Kabagambe Kaliisa, the Permanent Secretary of the energy ministry. A barrel of oil is currently at $87.
Currently, fossil diesel is going for sh2,340 a litre. It costs VEDCO sh15,000 in fuel to mill a tonne of rice while it would cost sh23,400 with fossil fuel. They estimate that it costs them about sh1,875 to produce a litre of biodiesel and they also need 20% less fuel when using biodiesel. “We used to need 10 litres of diesel to mill a tonne of rice but with biodiesel, we used only eight,†says Solomon Kiggundu, the VEDCO officer in charge of the biodiesel project. Royal Van Zanten officials also agree with the 20% lower fuel consumption rate. Currently energy official are skeptical about the feasibility of using ethanol as a transport fuel saying that supply may be difficult.
“The alcohol which would be used is being consumed by people drinking enguuli (local gin),†says Kaliisa.
Today, a litre of enguuli or crude ethanol will be bought sh3,000, a price it may not fetch as a transport fuel but if more efficient methods of extraction are used, this price could go lower.
“Biofuels are cleaner and safer for the environment,†says Kalisa. Using fossil fuels blended with environmentally friendly biofuels could reduce Uganda’s carbondioxide emissions by a million tons by the year 2010, according to the ministry of energy’s policy document on renewable energy.
Biofuels are biodegradable and non – toxic, which makes them cleaner greener fuels. “Biodiesel can rot and has no sulphur addictives therefore its waste can be disposed of without affecting the soil and environment,†says Kiggundu.
Globally it is feared that the oil reserves are depleting fast and that if the world continues to use oil at the current rate, the reserves will only take us another 40 years.
It is, therefore, imperative that alternative sources of energy be sought. Bio fuel is one of those alternatives. In contrast to fossil fuel, biofuel is renewable, so depleting reserves may never be an issue. The plants from which biofuel is extracted can be planted again and again.
Biofuels are also known to have a number of advantages over the petroleum one. “Using biodiesel can extend the life of diesel engines because it is more lubricating than petroleum diesel fuel,†says Kiggundu of VEDCO.
Biodiesel burns at 300 degrees fahrenheit as compared to petroleum diesel which burns at 125F. It is therefore safer to transport in term of risks of fire. In addition, biofuel can be made at home by the end use.
“The technology for making biodiesel is not complex. Once it has been set up by an engineer, the farmer can take over and run it easily,†Kiggundu asserts.
While advocates for biofuel are not short of glory songs, it also has it critics. A years ago, the European Union jumped at the idea of using biofuel for transport and set a target that 10% of Europe’s road fuel would be bio.
Now the EU appears to be developing cold feet about this policy. “We have seen that the environmental problems caused by biofuels and also the social problems are bigger than we thought they were. So we have to move very carefully,†Stavros Dimas, EU’s environmental chief, told the BBC recently.
One of the biggest concerns is that using food crops like maize, sugar cane and soya beans to produce fuel is going to drive up the prices of these crops, increasing the problem of hunger in the wider world.
In Uganda, biodiesel is being extracted from jatropha, a non-edible oil rich plant, a move that biofuel advocates feel should alleviate the fears about food prices.
Kaliisa also argues that we will still be able to fill fuel tanks and dining tables if we can use technology to improve our crop yields. “If you are not getting enough from the crops, think about using fertilisers to improve the yields,†he argues. Presently, scientists are researching the possibility of producing biofuel from genetically modified bacteria.
Another fear concerning food security is that people will rush to sow oil plants, leaving little land for food cultivation.
Again, Kalisa does not see this as being a problem for Uganda in particular saying that presently a lot of land is not being put to effective use.
“When you travel from Hoima to Kiboga, nearly all the land is bush. how can you say we will run out of land?†he dismisses this fear. So far the industrial players in Uganda are concentrating on using crops that will not necessarily need to use up arable plant for food crops. “One of the reasons, we chose to use jatropha is that it can do well in unarable land,†VEDCO’s Kisitu allays this fear.
Environmentalists are wary of the intentions to replace our biodiversity with vast farms of monocultured oil plants. “We can do intercropping,†Kaliisa argues. “I am a farmer and I have jatropha hedges around my farm, on which are other crop varieties,†he adds.
The biofuel revolution comes at a time when Uganda has just discovered her oil resources. This raises fear that biofuels will give the young oil market unneeded competition but energy officials argue that biofuels will actually do the industry some good. “The ultimate goal is to preserve the life of the oil reserves,†Kaliisa says, adding that even in the long run, biofuel will only contribute 20% of our road fuels.
Deforestation is another of the environmental concerns the idea of ‘planting’ oil raises.
“The government (of Uganda) will license the encroached national forest reserves to investors (community based or private) for sustainable energy production,†says the renewable energy policy document.
In Indonesia, where oil is extracted from palm seeds, farmers are extensively cutting down rain forests to plant palm trees.
Whether or not our energy policy will lead us into the same temptation, remains to be seen.
In the end though, it is clear that biofuels come with a lot of advantages for a country like Uganda, which is energy constrained yet rich in terms of agricultural resources.
However, a number of social and environmental issues must be taken into account if the production of these green fuels is to be sustainable.
The current Kenyan crisis has Ugandan urbanites biting their nails in anxiety about the rising fuel prices. Yet, this crisis is merely swelling a boil we have always had.
Erratic and steep fuel prices are the nemesis of nearly every sub-Saharan African country. For instance, pump prices in Uganda exceed those in Australia by more than 50% even on a good day.
Yet, we can literally grow fuel in our backyards by planting crops like jatropha, maize, sugarcane, soya beans and others from which biofuel can be extracted.
Biofuel, which is fuel extracted from agricultural produce, can be produced either as biodiesel, which is extracted from vegetable seeds or as bioethanol from starch and sugar plants. Biodiesel is used to run diesel engines while bioethanol runs petrol engines. Ethanol converted into ethanol gel is used for cooking and lighting.
Uganda has the capacity to produce substantial amounts of biodiesel and small amounts of ethanol are already being produced as a by product of sugar factories.
The ministry of energy estimates that if the production of biofuel is encouraged, Uganda will be able to reduce her diesel and petrol imports by 10,000 tonnes a year.
Biofuel is already available on the Ugandan market for cooking and lighting lamps, under the trade name Liquifire.
According to the new renewable energy policy, oil companies will be compelled to blend their fuel imports with up to 20% biofuels.
Some companies in Uganda have already invested in the biofuel technology. VEDCO, a Wobulenzi- based agricultural community organisation, started producing biodiesel for their rice miller in August 2006. They are now running their rice mill on biodiesel only.
“What we are doing here is a pilot project but we are looking to extend the technology to the farmers in the villages,†said Dan Kisitu, an assistant project manager with VEDCO.
Royal Van Zanten, a local flower farm, has also sunk close to sh160m into the technology. Last year, the company produced 3,000 litres of fuel from about 9,000kg of jatropha seeds bought from vanilla farmers who usually grow jatropha as support plants for the vanilla.
In the countryside, locals are reportedly already adding enguuli (local gin) to petrol to run vehicles
Other African countries are also eager to turn farm fields into oil fields. Nigeria, is currently making ethanol from cassava, Malawi is producing sugarcane ethanol and so is Mozambique. Nigeria aims at producing cassava ethanol worth over $150m every year, while the government of Mozambique has set aside over US$700m for biofuel research, production and promotion, according to the Science and Development Network, an international web- based information agency on the role of science in development.
This haste to invest in and encourage biofuels is driven by a number of factors including concerns about total dependence on imported and expensive fossil fuels, pollution being caused by emissions from fossil fuels, the need to conserve the already depleting oil reserves as well as other relative advantages that biofuels have over their fossil counterparts.
“It is in our interest to diversify the energy mix in order to reduce dependence,†Daudi Migereko, the energy minister, told journalists last year.
Currently, Uganda needs close to 840 million litres of fuel annually, all of which must be imported.The prices of these imports are unpredictable and very high. If the 20% blending target is achieved, about 168 million litres of fuel would be homegrown.
Being an agro economy, Uganda will be able to use her agricultural produce, including wild waste plants, more profitably - for energy production. “Before we started making biofuel, jatropha was a waste plant here but now farmers are earning at least sh200 for every kilo of jatropha seeds,†Kisutu of VEDCO points at the advantages of biofuel production to local farmers.
Biofuels if produced with very efficient methods are also seen as cheaper than fossil fuels especially for agro communities like Uganda.
As long as a barrel of oil is more than $35, biofuel as an alternative is an economically more viable option, according to Kabagambe Kaliisa, the Permanent Secretary of the energy ministry. A barrel of oil is currently at $87.
Currently, fossil diesel is going for sh2,340 a litre. It costs VEDCO sh15,000 in fuel to mill a tonne of rice while it would cost sh23,400 with fossil fuel. They estimate that it costs them about sh1,875 to produce a litre of biodiesel and they also need 20% less fuel when using biodiesel. “We used to need 10 litres of diesel to mill a tonne of rice but with biodiesel, we used only eight,†says Solomon Kiggundu, the VEDCO officer in charge of the biodiesel project. Royal Van Zanten officials also agree with the 20% lower fuel consumption rate. Currently energy official are skeptical about the feasibility of using ethanol as a transport fuel saying that supply may be difficult.
“The alcohol which would be used is being consumed by people drinking enguuli (local gin),†says Kaliisa.
Today, a litre of enguuli or crude ethanol will be bought sh3,000, a price it may not fetch as a transport fuel but if more efficient methods of extraction are used, this price could go lower.
“Biofuels are cleaner and safer for the environment,†says Kalisa. Using fossil fuels blended with environmentally friendly biofuels could reduce Uganda’s carbondioxide emissions by a million tons by the year 2010, according to the ministry of energy’s policy document on renewable energy.
Biofuels are biodegradable and non – toxic, which makes them cleaner greener fuels. “Biodiesel can rot and has no sulphur addictives therefore its waste can be disposed of without affecting the soil and environment,†says Kiggundu.
Globally it is feared that the oil reserves are depleting fast and that if the world continues to use oil at the current rate, the reserves will only take us another 40 years.
It is, therefore, imperative that alternative sources of energy be sought. Bio fuel is one of those alternatives. In contrast to fossil fuel, biofuel is renewable, so depleting reserves may never be an issue. The plants from which biofuel is extracted can be planted again and again.
Biofuels are also known to have a number of advantages over the petroleum one. “Using biodiesel can extend the life of diesel engines because it is more lubricating than petroleum diesel fuel,†says Kiggundu of VEDCO.
Biodiesel burns at 300 degrees fahrenheit as compared to petroleum diesel which burns at 125F. It is therefore safer to transport in term of risks of fire. In addition, biofuel can be made at home by the end use.
“The technology for making biodiesel is not complex. Once it has been set up by an engineer, the farmer can take over and run it easily,†Kiggundu asserts.
While advocates for biofuel are not short of glory songs, it also has it critics. A years ago, the European Union jumped at the idea of using biofuel for transport and set a target that 10% of Europe’s road fuel would be bio.
Now the EU appears to be developing cold feet about this policy. “We have seen that the environmental problems caused by biofuels and also the social problems are bigger than we thought they were. So we have to move very carefully,†Stavros Dimas, EU’s environmental chief, told the BBC recently.
One of the biggest concerns is that using food crops like maize, sugar cane and soya beans to produce fuel is going to drive up the prices of these crops, increasing the problem of hunger in the wider world.
In Uganda, biodiesel is being extracted from jatropha, a non-edible oil rich plant, a move that biofuel advocates feel should alleviate the fears about food prices.
Kaliisa also argues that we will still be able to fill fuel tanks and dining tables if we can use technology to improve our crop yields. “If you are not getting enough from the crops, think about using fertilisers to improve the yields,†he argues. Presently, scientists are researching the possibility of producing biofuel from genetically modified bacteria.
Another fear concerning food security is that people will rush to sow oil plants, leaving little land for food cultivation.
Again, Kalisa does not see this as being a problem for Uganda in particular saying that presently a lot of land is not being put to effective use.
“When you travel from Hoima to Kiboga, nearly all the land is bush. how can you say we will run out of land?†he dismisses this fear. So far the industrial players in Uganda are concentrating on using crops that will not necessarily need to use up arable plant for food crops. “One of the reasons, we chose to use jatropha is that it can do well in unarable land,†VEDCO’s Kisitu allays this fear.
Environmentalists are wary of the intentions to replace our biodiversity with vast farms of monocultured oil plants. “We can do intercropping,†Kaliisa argues. “I am a farmer and I have jatropha hedges around my farm, on which are other crop varieties,†he adds.
The biofuel revolution comes at a time when Uganda has just discovered her oil resources. This raises fear that biofuels will give the young oil market unneeded competition but energy officials argue that biofuels will actually do the industry some good. “The ultimate goal is to preserve the life of the oil reserves,†Kaliisa says, adding that even in the long run, biofuel will only contribute 20% of our road fuels.
Deforestation is another of the environmental concerns the idea of ‘planting’ oil raises.
“The government (of Uganda) will license the encroached national forest reserves to investors (community based or private) for sustainable energy production,†says the renewable energy policy document.
In Indonesia, where oil is extracted from palm seeds, farmers are extensively cutting down rain forests to plant palm trees.
Whether or not our energy policy will lead us into the same temptation, remains to be seen.
In the end though, it is clear that biofuels come with a lot of advantages for a country like Uganda, which is energy constrained yet rich in terms of agricultural resources.
However, a number of social and environmental issues must be taken into account if the production of these green fuels is to be sustainable.