Abstract
Ethiopia has been disseminating biogas technology as an alternative renewable energy source to reduce excessive dependence on traditional biomass. Despite its potential, only a small percentage of (0.8%) of the potential households are benefiting from domestic biogas. There is limited empirical evidence concerning both its adoption and the overall contribution of the technology in Arbaminch Zuria Woreda.
This study was conducted with the objectives of quantifying the socio-economic contribution of biogas technology adoption, measuring the environmental benefits of adopting biogas technology, and examining factors affecting households’ decisions of biogas technology adoption in the study area. A total of 217 sample households were selected following a stratified random sampling approach. Structured and Semi-structured surveys, measurement of fuel masses, FGDs, and key informants’ interviews were used as data collection instruments. Descriptive statistics, independent sample t-test, dependent sample t-test, and binary logistic regression model were used to analyze the collected data. Results showed that the use of biogas technology has significant contributions to improving the livelihood of rural people. It helps to reduce energy consumption by 30,494.58 MJ per year per household. Its substantiated households’ income by reducing the costs to be incurred for fuel-wood, charcoal, and kerosene consumptions by saving ETB 3,337.46 annually. It also minimizes the household workloads on average by 2.42 hours per week. Traditional biomass substitutions with biogas reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emission on average by about 2.4t of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) per digester per year. The regression result revealed that the education level of the head of household, family size, availability of fuel-wood, awareness, and access to credit was found to be the most important factors that affect the adoption of biogas technology. The study recommends that the County government should employ strategies such as education, awareness, provision of credit, and exploiting the existing carbon market that may go a long way in encouraging households to adopt biogas technology.
Keywords: Adoption, Arbaminch Zuria Woreda, Biogas technology, GHG, Kerosene, Traditional-biomass.