| dc.description.abstract | Although access to electricity power supply is critical to national development, utility companies in
Uganda either lack the financial capacity to expand their grids to isolated rural areas or choose not to
do so due to low return on investment. Mini grid using biomass would be an effective solution to
providing power to remote/rural households.
This study evaluated the resource and technology feasible for generating electrical energy from cocoa
pod husks (an agricultural residue/waste) generated in Uganda. The use of agricultural waste for
energy generation is the most suitable for the rural population in Uganda because of the availability of
the raw material for its production (renewable and clean) and the lack of competition of use. The
inability to convert these solid wastes into useful products culminates into environmentally related
challenges (such as land fill, global warming, and floods), pests and diseases. The amount of CPH
generated in Uganda was estimated. The physio-chemical analysis showed that the proportion of the
Cocoa Pod Husks (CPHs) in the fresh pod was about 74%. This value was close to the one reported in
literature. The analysis of dry matter content of the CPH was found to have an average of 19% and an
average energy of 17.5 MJ/kg at 14% moisture which comparable to bagasse, 18.2 MJ/kg at 14%
moisture Mbugua, M, et al., (2014) (See Appendix I). On this basis, the results showed that the energy
of 11.93 MWh of energy can be produced each year from CPHs in Uganda. This study therefore,
showed that the CPHs is an important energy source. There is an increasing trend in cocoa and CPHs
production in Uganda per year, hence, the electricity production from CPHs is sustainable and can be
up scaled.
The electricity generation technologies and economics have also been assessed to come up with the
optimum option for CPHs conversion and electricity commercialization in Uganda. In doing so, the
solid waste can be reduced, the income can be improved, the environment is conserved and the energy
is produced. The electricity generation potential from CPHs in Uganda was found to increase annually
up to 2.97 MW in 2018 from approximately 19092 tones
of dry CPHs. The analysis in this study identified direct combustion as the suitable technology to be
used because of its low cost and due the fact that the process is mature with a technology readiness
level (TRL) of 9, the costs, input and outputs are fully known. The technology is already in
application with bagasse in Uganda and CPH can also be co-fired with bagasse. The efficiency of
about 30% is comparable with those of pyrolysis and gasification. The capacity of power plant was
estimated to be 1.604 MW. The unit of electricity would therefore cost 0.077 USD/kWh, which is
close to the national target of 0.04 USD/kWh compared to the current average electricity market price
of (UGX 780) ≈ 0.22USD per unit in Uganda. From the results of this study, it has been envisioned
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that converting ‘cocoa waste’ into commercial products (i.e. electricity and others) would lead to
sustainable value chain of cocoa production. | en_US |
