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Abstract:

Background:Exclusive clean fuel use is essential for realizing health and other benefits but is often unaffordable. Decreasing household-level fuel needs could make exclusive clean fuel use more affordable, but there is a lack of knowledge on the amount of fuel savings that could be achieved through fuel conservation behaviors relevant to rural settings in low- and middle-income countries.Methods:Within a trial in Peru, we trained a random half of intervention participants, who had previously received a liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) stove and were purchasing their own fuel, on fuel conservation strategies. We measured the amount of fuel and mega joules (MJ) of energy consumed by all participants, including control participants who were receiving free fuel from the trial. We administered surveys on fuel conservation behaviors and assigned a score based on the number of behaviors performed.Results:Intervention participants with the training had a slightly higher conservation score than those without (7.2 vs. 6.6 points; p = 0.07). Across all participants, average daily energy consumption decreased by 9.5 MJ for each 1-point increase in conservation score (p < 0.001). Among households who used exclusively LPG (n = 99), each 1-point increase in conservation score was associated with a 0.04 kg decrease in LPG consumption per household per day (p = 0.03). Using pressure cookers and heating water in the sun decreased energy use, while using clay pots and forgetting to close stove knobs increased energy use.Conclusion:Our findings suggest that a household could save 1.16 kg of LPG per month for each additional fuel conservation behavior, for a maximum potential savings of 8.1 kg per month. Fuel conservation messaging could be integrated into national household energy policies to increase the affordability of exclusive clean fuel use, and subsequently achieve the environmental and health benefits that could accompany such a transition.D43 TW011502/TW/FIC NIH HHSUnited States/UF2 CE002402/CE/NCIPC CDC HHSUnited States/U01 TW010107/TW/FIC NIH HHSUnited States/T32 ES007141/ES/NIEHS NIH HHSUnited States/D43 TW009340/TW/FIC NIH HHSUnited States/T32 HL007534/HL/NHLBI NIH HHSUnited States

Abstract:

Land use and its management can play a vital role in carbon sequestration, but trade-offs may exist with other objectives including food security and nature recovery. Using an integrated model (the FABLE calculator), four pathways, co-created with colleagues at the Welsh Government, towards achieving climate and biodiversity targets in Wales were explored: status quo, improvements on current trends, land sparing and land sharing. We found that continuing as usual will not be sufficient to meet Wales’s climate and biodiversity targets. In contrast, the land use and agricultural sector became a net carbon sink in both the land sparing and land sharing pathways, through high afforestation targets, peatland restoration, reducing food waste and moving towards a healthier diet. Whilst both pathways released land for biodiversity, the gains were greater in the land sharing pathway, which was also less dependent on optimistic assumptions concerning productivity improvements. The results demonstrate that alternative approaches to achieving nature-positive and carbon–neutral land use and food systems may be possible, but they come with stringent and transformative requirements for policy changes, with an integrated approach necessary to maximise benefits for climate, food and nature.