Design, Fabrication and Testing of Biogas Stove for ‘Areke’ Distillation:The case of Arsi Negele, Ethiopia, Targeting Reduction of Fuel-Wood Dependence

Abstract

In Ethiopia, in addition to the already existing burden on natural resource imposed by the use of traditional biomass for cooking, the processing and production of alcoholic beverages such as local liquor (‘Areke’), local beer (‘Tela’), ‘Korefe’, ‘Borde’ and others place further threat on the forest. Research on potential assessment of biogas to replace the fuel wood consumption has revealed a promising result of biomass dependence reduction. This study showed that if sustainable biogas energy development is implemented, the dependency on fuel wood can be reduced by 27.7% by reducing 32, 763.70 tons of GHGs emission annually in Arsi Negele alone. Therefore, through this study analytically designing the biogas stove for minimum gas consumption and high efficiency, fabrication and experimental testing is done. Additionally the economic projection of biogas utilization in Areke distillation is evaluated and found to be economically feasible with a payback period of a little over three years. The overall efficiency of the stove evaluated through Water Boiling Test (WBT) is found to be 54.8% , 43.6% at higher flame intensity and relatively lower flame intensity respectively. The stove showed a remarkable reduction in time taken for distilling a pot of distill and which is nearly half of the time it took to distill a pot of distilland using wood. The new stove consumes only 0.994 m3 of biogas while the biogas stove tested before which is ordinary biogas stove for general cooking purpose consumes 2.088 m3 to distill a pot of distilland. Even though the initial investments are high, with the conducive environment available for biogas production at Arsi Negele, using biogas for Areke distillation without any doubt can be a viable option for ecofriendly and economically feasible production of traditional Areke. Therefore, any concerned government and nongovernment body should act in promoting either by piloting or partly funding the installation while putting the sense of ownership in the mind of the users.