The continuing importance of biomass as a source of household energy has raised the
question of whether local supply would be sufficient to meet demand.
This study examined
the above question. A total of 288 households in three communities with different degrees
of urbanization in Khon Kaen province in Northeast Thailand were interviewed and
observed for their uses of different types of energy and the ways by which biomass were
acquired. The results showed that the vast majority of households in the rural and suburban
communities (89.0 and 81.3%, respectively) and about half (53.3%) of urban households
obtained all their biomass fuel by collecting it. Most agricultural and irregular income
households relied more on collecting, mainly from their own land supplemented by public
land, whereas business owner and regular income households relied more on purchasing
to obtain their biomass energy supplies. On average, a rural household consumed
20.4 GJ y1 of biomass energy while a suburban household used 18.5 GJ y1, representing
the energy value of 2362 and 2062 kg of wood, respectively. These demands could be
sustainably met by the annual growth increment of 68 and 59 Eucalyptus trees for a rural
and a suburban household, respectively. These could be achieved by planting trees in a
small area or in a line on the paddy bunds or property boundary lines. It is, thus, possible
for most rural and some suburban households to be self-sufficient in biomass energy for
household consumption by integration of trees into their farming systems.