Abstract
The purposes for which biogas technology was introduced at household level were multiple but the major and direct one was to provide a clean and sustainable energy, thereby reducing the reliance on wood fuel. From the socio-economic studies that have been carried out, biogas end-users and technicians continue to be blamed for technical factors hindering its adoption and use. However, the ways these factors hinder biogas adoption and use plus the linkage between them seem not well understood right from policy to end-users. A technical survey was carried out on household biogas digesters to evaluate the adoption, use and management factors and their implications on the future of household digesters. Over-designed digesters in relation to family size yet not producing enough biogas, dependence on cow dung as the feedstock, 75% of users not being sure of loading rate and mixing ratios, not feeding the digesters daily by all households were found to be the main causes of why biogas was not enough for 87.5% of the respondents and digesters were abandoned in Kampala, Uganda. All surveyed digesters were characterized by starvation-overfeeding problem. Wood fuel was found still dominating in these households with biogas. Given that end-users had no options of digester types from which to select, but handed-over with over-size fixed dome digesters, there is need for all biogas stakeholders to come together as the reality on ground reveals that right from inception to management, everyone is to blame for the technical failures.
Highlights
In the need to provide sustainable clean energy to the ever growing population, biogas technology has been seen as one of the renewable energy sources that can cause a paradigm shift on communities, especially in the developing countries
Over-designed digesters in relation to family size yet not producing enough biogas, dependence on cow dung as the feedstock, 75% of users not being sure of loading rate and mixing ratios, not feeding the digesters daily by all households were found to be the main causes of why biogas was not enough for 87.5% of the respondents and digesters were abandoned in Kampala, Uganda
Given that end-users had no options of digester types from which to select, but handed-over with over-size fixed dome digesters, there is need for all biogas stakeholders to come together as the reality on ground reveals that right from inception to management, everyone is to blame for the technical failures
Summary
In the need to provide sustainable clean energy to the ever growing population, biogas technology has been seen as one of the renewable energy sources that can cause a paradigm shift on communities, especially in the developing countries. Such technical factors include how much is fed into the digester per unit time (loading rate), number of times the digester is fed, mixing ratio of water and the substrate at hand as well as the ratios between substrates where more than one is being used, digester size and type and available substrate among others These and more continue to be silent technical factors which seem to be not well understood right from policy to end-users in ways how they hinder biogas adoption and use plus the linkage between them, but have received little attention from researchers. The intention is to inform and guide policy when planning, implementing and managing biogas projects
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