Abstract
Fuel-wood burning is a major part of fulfilling energy requirement in rural Uttarakhand India. To analyze CO2 emission from fuel wood burning /consumption rate at the household level at different altitude villages we surveyed seventy-two (N=72) villages in five (N=5) districts in Uttarakhand. The villages were categorized into three categories based on their altitudes (I) 1000-2000mts., (II) 2001-2300 Mtr., (III) 2301- 3200 Mtr. Fuel-wood consumption was estimated by closely calculating the daily actual wood consumed at the household level in villages categorized according to altitude. In the study 351 households were surveyed, of this 28 %, were between 1000-2000mts., 55.8%, of households were sampled in villages between 2001-2300 Mtr., and 16% of households were sampled between 2301 - 3200 Mtr. respectively. The average fuel-wood consumption at households’ level in categories (I) was 11 kg/ day, in category (II) was 14.6 kg/day and in category (III) it was 17.2 kg/day. The overall average value of fuel-wood consumption in all three categories was 14.26 kg/day/ household at the state level. Twenty-nine (N=29) species are primarily being used as fuel-wood in which Litcea monopetela, Bahunia varigata, Grewia, optiva, Pirus pashia, Pinus roxburghii, Quercus leucotricophora and Myrica sapadia, Betula Utilis has a major share. Annual carbon emission from fuel-wood burning in rural areas was also estimated using the formula provided by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC 1996). The annual carbon emission values for sampled villages in five districts of Uttarakhand (rural) are (I) Almora 1081.4 MtCO2, (II) Bageshwer 479.1 Mt CO2, (III) Champawat 405.6M t CO2(IV) Pithoragarh 829.8 Mt CO2(V) Tehri Garhwal 1025.7 MtCO 2. The total CO2 emission value for all five districts was 3821.6 MtCO2 annually through fuel-wood burning.
Highlights
Uttarakhand state has 34661.52 sq km of area under forests cover which is about 64.81 percent of its total geographical area of this roughly around 15 percent of the forest areas are either community forests or Van Panchayat forest
Fuel-wood collection and consumption are intricately linked with degradation of forest areas in Uttarakhand, and surprisingly high carbon emission values through the use of traditional Chula in which are presently being used in all the villages
Tree Species being used for fuel-wood: In total twenty-nine (N=29) trees species were identified during the survey which was being used for fuel-wood consumption at different altitudes
Summary
Uttarakhand state has 34661.52 sq km of area under forests cover which is about 64.81 percent of its total geographical area of this roughly around 15 percent of the forest areas are either community forests or Van Panchayat forest. As the density of gas connection in villages are not evenly distributed and Applied Ecology and Environmental Sciences the supply is not regular, due to low income of households village people tend to collect the wood which is freely available instead of any other source of energy for cooking purposes. This position has lead gradually in an acute shortage of fuel-wood in many low and mid-altitude villages in Uttarakhand. Firewood accounts for over 54 % of all global harvests per annum which results in the huge amount of forest loss [8]
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
