Determining The Gambia's Bioenergy and Hydrogen Production Potential from Agricultural Residue and Municipal Solid Waste, Implementation Strategies and its impact on Development

Abstract

To ensure The Gambia meets its long-term energy development goals this thesis investigates implementation strategies to introduce alternative energy sources namely bioenergy and hydrogen production into the energy mix of the country and its development policies. To achieve this, the thesis aims at assessing the country’s potential for producing bioenergy and hydrogen from agricultural residue namely: rice, cassava, groundnuts, maize, sorghum, oil palm fruit, seed cotton, millet, and municipal solid waste. The theoretical potential of the organic fraction of municipal solid waste and the crop residue was calculated from the year 2017 to 2038. These results were then used to calculate the biomethane and electricity production potential with the use of Buswell’s equation from which using stoichiometry the hydrogen production potential was calculated using steam methane reforming. The technical potential for electricity and hydrogen was then calculated with the use of their respective conversion efficiencies. Using geographic information systems (GIS), the location of a pilot plant was then identified considering the resources the available land area, and its accessibility. The results show that 64.5MW of electricity and 6,228,443.7kmol of hydrogen can be potentially generated in the year 2038. Using these results, a strategy on automated data collection, awareness, and waste-to-energy was designed to fill in the data, management, and infrastructural gaps in The Gambia.