Analysis of Household Use of Traditional Fuels and Possible Contribution to Deforestation in Kisii County, Kenya

A large majority of Kenyans still rely on traditional fuels to meet their domestic cooking needs. The demand for traditional biomass is therefore likely to increase in the coming decades as long as they remain the most readily available and affordable in comparison to modern energy options. This research sought to analyze the household use of traditional fuels and its possible contribution to deforestation in Kisii County. The willingness of respondents to adopt alternative biofuels and energy efficient stoves and barriers encountered were also assessed. Two structured questionnaires that contained both open and close-ended questions were administered to 436 households and 40 wood fuel sellers respectively. Analysis of variance and regression analysis were used to analyze the alternative hypotheses of the study. It was established that the use of charcoal was the most prevalent compared to other fuels. Household consumption of traditional fuels contributed to an estimated loss of 39 ha of forest cover per annum. However, since 89.7% of the wood fuel used was sourced from other counties, the loss of biomass did not occur in Kisii County. Given a chance, about 63% of the respondents were willing to adopt alternative biofuels and energy efficient stoves. However, the greatest barrier to the adoption of these alternatives was the high cost of purchase. Other barriers identified included lack of government support and unwillingness to let go of traditional cooking practices. It was recommended that the Kenyan government and other stakeholders should promote local technologies for producing energy efficient stoves to make them more affordable to the populace.

Intelligent Vehicle Electrical Power Supply System with Central Coordinated Protection

The current research of vehicle electrical power supply system mainly focuses on electric vehicles（EV） and hybrid electric vehicles（HEV）.The vehicle electrical power supply system used in traditional fuel vehicles is rather simple and imperfect;electrical/electronic devices（EEDs） applied in vehicles are usually directly connected with the vehicle＇s battery.With increasing numbers of EEDs being applied in traditional fuel vehicles,vehicle electrical power supply systems should be optimized and improved so that they can work more safely and more effectively.In this paper,a new vehicle electrical power supply system for traditional fuel vehicles,which accounts for all electrical/electronic devices and complex work conditions,is proposed based on a smart electrical/electronic device（SEED） system.Working as an independent intelligent electrical power supply network,the proposed system is isolated from the electrical control module and communication network,and access to the vehicle system is made through a bus interface.This results in a clean controller power supply with no electromagnetic interference.A new practical battery state of charge（So C） estimation method is also proposed to achieve more accurate So C estimation for lead-acid batteries in traditional fuel vehicles so that the intelligent power system can monitor the status of the battery for an over-current state in each power channel.Optimized protection methods are also used to ensure power supply safety.Experiments and tests on a traditional fuel vehicle are performed,and the results reveal that the battery So C is calculated quickly and sufficiently accurately for battery over-discharge protection.Over-current protection is achieved,and the entire vehicle＇s power utilization is optimized.For traditional fuel vehicles,the proposed vehicle electrical power supply system is comprehensive and has a unified system architecture,enhancing system reliability and security.