Regional Bioenergy Planning for Sustainability in Himachal Pradesh, India

Forfattere

  • Ramachandra T V Energy and Wetlands Research Group Centre for Ecological Sciences Indian Institute of Science Bangalore 560 012 India
  • Gautham Krishnadas Energy & Wetlands Research Group, Center for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore 560 012, Karnataka, India (http://ces.iisc.ernet.in/energy)
  • Bharath Setturu Energy & Wetlands Research Group, Center for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore 560 012, Karnataka, India (http://ces.iisc.ernet.in/energy)
  • Uttam Kumar Energy & Wetlands Research Group, Center for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore 560 012, Karnataka, India (http://ces.iisc.ernet.in/energy)

Nøgleord:

Bioenergy, decision support system, sustainability, forest fragmentation

Resumé

 Energy system in mountainous regions is complex due to the wide variations in the availability and demand of energy resources. Mountain inhabitants are traditionally dependent on bioenergy resources such as fuel wood, agro and animal residues for meeting their energy requirements for heating, cooking, etc. However, depleting forest resources limit the availability of fuel wood while commercial sources such as LPG and kerosene fail to meet the domestic energy demands due to logistic and economic constraints. Hence, the inhabitants are forced to follow inefficient and ad hoc usage of juvenile forest trees (thus hindering regeneration), agro and animal residues, disregarding their alternative utilities. This deteriorates the ecological harmony and demands for sustainable resource planning in the regional level. The study assesses the bioresource availability and its potential to meet the bioenergy demands of three mountain districts in the western Himalayan federal state of Himachal Pradesh. Regions of bioenergy surplus or deficit are identified for different scenarios. The ecological status of forests and actual availability along with the demand of fuel wood in villages are analysed to highlight the significance of decentralized regional-level bioenergy resource planning. Bioenergy potential assessment (BEPA) – a decision support system (DSS) – to facilitate compilation, analysis, representation, interpretation, comparison and evaluation of regional bioresource has been used to visualize bioenergy status. This supports energy planners and policy makers in efficient disaggregated bioenergy resource planning to mitigate the carbon imbalances while meeting the subsistence and development needs of mountain inhabitants, at least cost to the environment and economy.Keywords: Bioenergy, decision support system, sustainability, forest fragmentation 

Forfatterbiografi

  • Ramachandra T V, Energy and Wetlands Research Group Centre for Ecological Sciences Indian Institute of Science Bangalore 560 012 India
    Dr. T.V. Ramachandra, FIE, FIE(UK)  obtained Ph.D. in Ecology and Energy from Indian Institute of Science. At present, Coordinator of Energy and Wetlands Research Group (EWRG), Convener of Environmental Information System (ENVIS) at Centre  for Ecological Sciences (CES) and Convener, Ecology, Environment and Urban Policy Research at Centre for infrastructure, Sustainable Transportation and Urban planning (CiSTUP), Indian Institute of Science. During the past fifteen years he has established an active school of research in the area of energy and environment (http://ces.iisc.ernet.in/energy). He was a Member of Karnataka State level Environment Expert Appraisal Committee (2007-2010), appointed by the Ministry of Environment and Forests, Government of India and a member of Western Ghats task force appointed by the Government of Karnataka. TVR’s research interests are in the area of energy systems, renewable energy, energy conservation, energy planning, aquatic ecosystems, biodiversity, ecological modeling, geoinformatics, environmental engineering education research and curriculum development at the tertiary level. He has published over 152 research papers in reputed peer reviewed international and national journals, 113 papers in the international and national symposiums as well as 14 books. In addition, he has delivered a number of plenary lectures at national and international conferences.

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Publiceret

2012-05-10

Nummer

Årg. 2 Nr. 1 (2012)

Sektion

Case Study

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