Problem overview:

     Awareness and visions: Efficient use of biomass energy derived from the realization that the conventional way of cooking was actually contributing to air pollution.

     Integrating stakeholders: The rural households were the main contributors to air pollution because almost every household has fossil fuel stoves. To reduce pollution, cooking stoves of every household need to be made efficient. That is why the stakeholders, whom in this case are rural households, play an important role in contributing to the success of the programme.

Background:

      Energy conservation through demand management

      Energy utilization, especially fossil fuel, contributes a great deal of greenhouse gas into the atmosphere. In order to prevent the accumulation of greenhouse gas, alternative energy sources should be brought into use along with improvement in the energy generation process. Here is an example of how demand management is carried out at community level in China.

      Currently, 61% of the rural household energy in china comes from traditional use of biomass. This means that each year approximately 4 billion tons of crop residues and woodfuel are burnt using stoves. Statistics from the Ministry of Agriculture of China show that rural energy consumption was about 20 GJ per capita in 1996, only one third of the nations average. It is predicted that the growing need for energy in rural areas will cause an energy shortage of about 4.6 billion GJ by the year 2000.

      The government has made tremendous efforts to accelerate rural energy development. The rural energy policy aims at minimizing commercial fuel use by focusing on efficiency improvement and developing renewable energy technology. Under this policy, biomass energy the main energy source in rural areas, has been given top priority. Many related projects have been carried out nation-wide:

• Plantation and reforestation. The energy supply and the environment in most areas have been improved. A pilot project on integrated rural energy development was carried out in Wuhua country of Guangdong province. In 14 years, the size of plantation reached 170,600 hectares and the forest coverage rate increased from 31.5% to 49.4%. the annual capacity of local energy production in the country increased by 62.78%.
  
  

• Improved cookstoves. From 1983 to 1996, stoves have been disseminated in 177 million households, which represents 76% of the total rural households in China. The efficiency of improved woodfuel stoves is 20%-30%, and approximately 13.62 million tons of wood has been saved annually. (See table 1.)
  
  

• Development and increased utilization of renewable energy As rural life improves, the demand for clean and convenient energy increases. With a view to local resources, various modern biomass technologies have been explored. From 1991 to 1997, available agricultural residues increased by 1.8% yearly, and amounted to 590 million tons. While 10% remained unused and was mostly burnt directly in the field, 35% was used in direct combustion with low efficiency. This has resulted in serious air pollution and waste of resources A new regulation came into force in April 1999, stating that 60% of the crop residues must be utilized by the year 2002. Gasification technology is currently being studied and 170 pilot projects are being carried out.

      These projects have contributed greatly to improve the rural environmental situation and reducing the emissions into the air. According to statistics on rural energy for 1996, energy conservation and renewable energy conservation and renewable energy use resulted in the reduction of 1.2 million tons of SO2 and 149.3 million tons of CO2. (See table 1)

      However, most of these projects depend to a large extend on chinas central subsidy system. It is expected that with the deepening of economic reform, subsidies will be significantly reduced and the market performance of these projects will be the key to their success. This is becoming one the main challenges facing Chinas rural energy development.

Table1: Annual energy saved and pollution reduced from the efficiency of improved fuelwood stoves