Kathmandu, January 5:

The government has decided to install 100,000 biogas plants in the country within three years with an aim to decrease the emission of greenhouse gases and promote the use of clean energy for household purposes.

This has been mentioned in the three-year interim plan (TYIP) endorsed by the government recently and the TYIP has provision for the project. The project would be executed by the Alternative Energy Promotion Centre (AEPC) with the technical support of Biogas Sector Partnership-Nepal (BSP-N) in 67 districts across the country. Remaining eight districts will not have biogas because of high-altitude problem. The AEPC has planned to install 22,000 plants this year and remaining in the next two years.

Govind Raj Pokharel, executive director of the AEPC, said: “The plan aims to reduce the use of fossil fuel or firewood for cooking and small household electrification, besides

decreasing the emission of carbon dioxide.”

“We could also earn millions for preventing the emission of carbon dioxide under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) under the Kyoto Protocol,” Pokharel said. Records have shown that 186,000 biogas plants have already been installed in the country. These are basically run by cattle dung and household wastes and there is a possibility that more 1.9 million such plants will be installed.

Two biogas support projects having around 20,000 biogas plants are already registered at the CDM. The plants are estimated to prevent the emission of around 100,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide annually. The country has started earning $7 per tonne every year.

Pokharel said the AEPC has recently received $514,000 as the first instalment for the

two CDM projects. “After the registration of remaining 166,000 plants and the planned 100,000, the country would not have to depend on the donors to run other biogas programmes,” he added.

According to Saroj Rai, executive director of the BSP-N, the installation of the biogas plants will start from next month and 70 companies will be selected to execute the installation. The government has decided to provide subsidy of about 30 per cent for a family for the installation of such plants.

Rai said the country may have three million more biogas plants, adding: “The plants would help maintain sanitation at homes, deforestation and slurry would replace the chemical fertiliser in agriculture.”