Abstract
In African nations, national and regional development targets for water and energy sectors seldom consider the nexus between the two, risking imbalances and inefficiencies in resource allocation and utilization. A typical example is the development and expansion of biofuel in the Wami Ruvu River Basin, Tanzania (WRB). Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) model was applied to the WRB to investigate the Water Energy Nexus (WEN), specifically, whether the development plan calling for biofuel expansion is a sound approach. Results show that WEN is much stronger in the biofuel irrigation consuming 69.3% and 61% of total biofuel’s water and energy requirement, respectively. By 2035, the nexus continues to be stronger, consuming 54.5% and 49% of total biofuel’s water and energy requirement, respectively, and thus first generation biofuels use much more resources in the growing than the refining process. An additional 768.2 million meter cubic of water and 413.4 million kWh of energy are needed for planned biofuel expansion, reallocating water to biofuels in water-scarce regions inherit related problems to other sectors such as increasing water use for the industry, agriculture, and energy sector by 67%, 45%, and 9%, respectively, which could further exacerbate stresses on water and energy supplies in the basin. Biofuel generation rely heavily on energy imports, as it consumes substantially more energy than it produces. Policies should promote the coordinated development of sustainable biofuel programs that are less water intensive with very low inputs of fossil fuels.
Highlights
The sustainable management of water and energy resources faces enormous challenges globally in the upcoming decades due to the increasing complexity of dealing with them [1,2,3]
Abdullahi et al [26] applied the Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) model and found that climate change will significantly reduce the runoff, and increases evapotranspiration in the Sokoto-Rima river basin in Nigeria; Höllermann et al [27] revealed that the pressure on water resources will increase, decreasing inflows and groundwater recharge due to climate change aggravate the situation in the Ouémé–Bonou catchment in Benin; Kinoti et al [31] used the model to balance the water requirements of competing users against the available water resources and found that the use of WEAP improved the complex system of demand-supply of the Ewaso Ng’iro river basin in Kenya
We evaluate Water Energy Nexus (WEN) in the WRB of Tanzania where a development plan calls for 50% increase in biofuel production by 2025 [45,46]
Summary
The sustainable management of water and energy resources faces enormous challenges globally in the upcoming decades due to the increasing complexity of dealing with them [1,2,3]. By 2050, global demand for energy will nearly double, while water and food demand is set to increase by over 50% [3]. Sustaining this upswing resource demand has driven the search for efficiency in water and energy sectors conjunctively, given competing needs for limited global resources in the era of climate change reality. The water–energy nexus has received global attention in recent years with a focus on how to balance their trade-offs [4], development agenda [5], interdependence [6], resources governance [7], and integrating one constraint into the other [8]. The Water-Energy Nexus(WEN) captures the interdependency between the two resources, and focuses on the need for water in the Energy supply chain, and on the energy used to collect, clean, move, store, and dispose of water [10,11,12,13]
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