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| Author: |
UNDP Ghana, 2004-11
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| Title: |
Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) Substitution for Wood Fuel in Ghana – Opportunities and Challenges |
| Publisher: |
UNDP Ghana, 8 pages
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| Type: |
Outreach
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| Country / Region: |
Ghana,
Africa
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| Categories: |
Technologies,
emission control technologies,
Energy Services
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| Themes/Issues: |
Development
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| Date Posted: |
2006-03-31 |
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A Brief Analysis of the LPG Sector in Ghana
LPG – a clean alternative to wood fuel:
Inadequate access to modern energy sources is a common predicament of rural communities all over Ghana. More than 90% of all households in Ghana rely on traditional biomass - fuel wood and charcoal - as the primary energy source for domestic cooking and other productive activities. The heavy dependence of a large segment of the population on biomass fuels has been recognized as a major socio-economic development obstacle for the country.
With increased awareness of the problems associated with burning fuel wood, Ghanaian society is today looking for cleaner and more modern alternatives. One of these is Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), which the Government of Ghana is promoting. A byproduct of crude oil refining, LPG is the generic name for compressed hydrocarbon gases, typically butane and propane. Because it is clean, safe and very efficient in generating heat, the use of LPG represents major progress and contributes to better quality of household life for many Ghanaians.
Advantages of LPG:
• Clean: LPG burns efficiently, without producing smoke and with low pollutant emissions. These inherently clean characteristics are especially important to reduce indoor air pollution and therefore, LPG is a major contribution to the better health of women and children.
• Portable: It is easily liquefied and stored in pressured containers. These properties make it portable, and hence, LPG can be easily transported in cylinders or tanks to endusers.
• Efficient: LPG is extremely efficient in generating heat, and therefore a major step up on the energy quality ladder.
• Multiple uses: LPG is an energy source capable of supporting multiple productive uses extending well beyond the household, such as developing micro-enterprises. Thus, it contributes to improving community life, health and sanitation by generating income at the community level.
From an environmental point of view, although it is derived from a fossil fuel, LPG emits much less carbon dioxide when burned than either coal or oil. As wood takes in as much carbon dioxide (CO2) to grow as it releases when burned, wood fuel is considered carbon dioxide neutral in terms of its greenhouse gas effect. However, traditional cooking stoves in Ghana are extremely inefficient, to the point of losing 90 per cent of the heat to the surroundings. Wood fuel therefore produces substantively more greenhouse gas emissions per meal than LPG.
Reliance on wood fuel and its consequences:
Ghana’s reliance on wood fuel has become a serious threat to the ecosystem of the country. Ghana's tropical forest area is today 25 percent of its original size. Yet, almost 2% or 22,000 hectares of forest are depleted every year. Next to commercial logging, agricultural practices and mining, the heavy reliance on wood fuel contributes to exacerbating this unsustainable trend. In the long run, this may well lead to a national ecological disaster. It is estimated that every person in Ghana currently uses around 1 cubic meter or 640 kg of fuel wood per annum. Although wood as biomass is often considered a renewable energy source, this only holds true if trees are replanted. Today, forest growth in Ghana is less than half of fuel wood demand. This makes fuel wood an unsustainable energy option.
From the point of view of public health as well, fuel wood is clearly the worst solution. Inefficient and poorly ventilated stoves cause indoor air pollution, which has significant health impacts. Women and children are primarily affected as they suffer from acute respiratory infections caused by the smoke. It is estimated that 4 to 5% of global diseases are a consequence of indoor pollution. Again, there is the issue of rural women being saddled with the problem of having to spend about 1 to 5 hours daily looking for fuel wood. Rural women are therefore constrained in the amount of time they can invest in income-generating activities daily.
LPG promotion in Ghana:
In 1990, Government of Ghana launched a National LPG Programme under which the Tema Oil Refinery was to be modernized and a massive LPG campaign to be implemented. This offered an opportunity to promote LPG as an alternate energy source to charcoal and firewood. The promotion targeted urban households, public institutions requiring mass catering facilities and the informal commercial sector including small-scale food sellers. Extensive promotional and educational campaigns were also carried out to ensure that environmental, health and safety regulations were observed and the benefits of switching to LPG communicated to the public.
Government’s initiative bore fruit as consumption of LPG doubled in 1992. Today, Ghana’s domestic consumption of LPG is over 50,000 tons per annum, which is about ten times higher than the quantities consumed before the LPG Promotional Programme was launched. It is worth noting that though the LPG Promotion Programme was successful in terms of general patronage and growth in the demand for LPG, its patronage was massively skewed to the urban areas. However, the level of LPG remained low even in the urban areas with a persisting high demand for wood fuel. Thus, the Ministry of Energy recognized that reaching the target set could not be achieved in the short term.
In the past years, the sector has taken the initial steps required to show commitment to the rural population and to ensure that the rural areas are not neglected. The Unified Petroleum Price Fund (UPPF) scheme initiated by the Government was meant to motivate transporters who travel to rural and distant locations, outside a radius of 200 km from the refinery. In spite of the UPPF Scheme, penetration of LPG in the rural areas is still not encouraging. Out of the 6% of Ghanaian households using LPG as their primary source of fuel for cooking, 70% reside in Accra and Ashanti Regions. In Accra, 22.7% of households currently use LPG.
In contrast, LPG in rural areas accounts for less than 1% of total national consumption.As of December 2003, there were 98 LPG filling stations in Ghana, 64 of which are situated in the Greater Accra region and only one station each in the Upper East and Upper West regions.
Presently, the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) produces enough LPG locally to meet domestic demand, with surplus for export. A major setback identified at the introductory stages of promoting LPG use was the relative high upfront cost as compared to that of wood fuel. The LPG cylinder contributes significantly to this cost.
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