Impact of Household Energy Efficiency and Behavioural Scenarios on CO2 Emissions of the Zambian Energy System

The electricity infrastructure of Zambia is facing a huge challenge when electrifying the non-electrified areas and serving the existing areas with increasing energy needs. The key issue in the development process is to improve the energy efficiency of the households and have an impact on the behaviour and attitudes of the households leading to energy savings and sustainable consumption. The current status of the energy consumption of the households was studied by a questionnaire survey conducted in 600 households in 3 provinces (Western, Copperbelt, Central) and two towns in each. The user study describes the current state of the technology in the households, the current status of the electricity consumption and scenarios of the near future household appliances and the corresponding electricity use. In the simulation study, the average household electricity use model was defined and adjusted to fit with the total use of Zambian household sector. The CO2 emission model was done using the simple emission factor method, in which the factor depends on the share of different types of electricity production typologies. The simulations consist of different cases and scenarios: different household appliances and investment in new ones, different use-time of the appliances, different scenarios in population and infrastructure as well as different scenarios in energy-type production shares (share of renewables vs non-renewables). The finding showed that energy consumption of the lighting could be decreased by 20-43% which would decrease the CO2 emissions due to household electricity use by 39000-81000 ton (2017 emission factors) if the improvements were done in all the households. The use of more energy efficient appliance such as lighting, refrigerators and TVs would decrease the electricity consumption by -74 % of the base case situation. This would decrease emissions by 141000 ton CO2.