Abstract
We investigate energy consumption patterns in Africa especially in the area of biomass fuels and fuel use in the transportation sector. Utilizing various data sources for the analysis. We find a broad but significant evidence that fuelwood is the most consumed cooking fuel in Africa and more so in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), where more than 80% depend on this fuel for cooking. It also reveals that the predominant cooking technology in SSA is traditional cookstoves. The high dependence on fuelwood usage via traditional cookstoves suggest that the utilization of biomass fuel for cooking is generally inefficient and creates a dependence pattern that is unsustainable.In the area of transportation, the evidence suggests though the motorisation rate in Africa is below the world average, it is still a major consumer of fossil fuel (oil demand) in Africa. This among other things suggest that the transport sector is inefficient in oil consumption, caused by factors that include poor infrastructure such as low paved roads (this create traffic congestion on the few motorable roads), poor maintenance and servicing culture and the high dependence on used cars.
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Notes
- 1.
See EIA (2007).
- 2.
See Energy Statistics Pocketbook (2018) for detail composition of fossil fuels in various regions of the world.
- 3.
See EIA (2007).
- 4.
See EIA (2016).
- 5.
This is inclusive of commercial and passenger vehicles and excludes motorbikes.
- 6.
According to Zacharof and Fontaras (2016) even though this estimate is likely to be overestimated it helps to educate vehicle owners the importance of ensuring a low mass to reduce fuel consumption.
- 7.
The IEA (2016) has conducted a comprehensive review of transportation mode and the share of energy consumption in its report, International Energy Outlook.
- 8.
Newman and Kenworthy (1999) argues that transportation is a key determinant of a city’s land use and thus affect the sustainability issues regarding land.
- 9.
African Urban Research Initiatives (2018) indicates that informal public transport currently dominates public transportation. However, they are unregulated in African countries and this makes their services poor. Fares fluctuate frequently, poor maintenance, overloading of passengers and lack of licensing characterize the sector.
- 10.
Alam and Ahmed (2013) defines urban congestion as excess of public demand for transportation over its supply. The authors argue that congestion is a key determinant of public transport and urban agglomeration in Asia.
- 11.
Bopp and Piatkowski (2018) indicate that traffic congestion from vehicles have had significant burden on global economy. For instance, in 2014 congestion in U.S. caused urban Americans to travel an additional 6.9 billion hours inducing 3.1 billion of gallons of fuel consumption.
- 12.
IBM’s Commuter Pain Index is a composite estimate of commuting time, traffic, gas price, stress and anger associated with driving and making decisions to avoid traffic.
- 13.
Ribeiro et al. (2012) indicates urbanization and decentralization of cities are key determinants of transport demand which induces fossil fuel consumption.
- 14.
International Association of public Transport (2008), through a survey concluded that road transport infrastructure accounts for 43 per cent of the inefficiency in public transport in Africa.
- 15.
A vehicle moving at 60Â km/h is likely to consume 25 per cent more of fuel in third rather than in the fifth gear. Similarly driving at high speed on low gear can use about 45 per cent more of fuel for every 60Â km/h.
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Karimu, A., Dramani, J.B. (2021). Energy Consumption Patterns in Africa: The Role of Biomass Fuels for Cooking and Fuel Use in the Transportation Sector. In: Bali Swain, R., Sweet, S. (eds) Sustainable Consumption and Production, Volume I. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-56371-4_16
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