Decision Support System for Regional Domestic Energy Planning

Rural energy planning depends solely on the existing levels of energy consumption in domestic sector. In India, energy requirements for cooking and water heating depend predominantly on biomass fuels, which are often burnt in traditional stoves (efficiency < 10%), while kerosene and electricity are used for lighting. Decision Support System (DSS) with relevant data helps the decision makers to take appropriate timelier decisions and assist in the evaluation of reliability and the generation of alternatives. This paper presents a conceptual framework for analyzing energy consumption at domestic sector via DSS. The framework is based on material flux, comparative analyses of village level domestic energy consumption patterns across various zones considering regional and seasonal variations. The system with a synergistic integration of software tools will assist decision makers in understanding the process status better and also aid in providing timelier decisions and efficient outputs. DSS is validated with the data pertaining to energy situation of Kolar district. Stratified random survey covering 2500 households distributed uniformly over the district shows that most households still use traditional stoves for cooking (97.92%) and water heating (98.3%)