Ethnobotany and human health.
Ashwani Kumar

Bioenergy is considered as the resource with the highest environmental impact amongst the renewable energy sources and this does not refer to incineration or waste treatment only, but it even applies to wood combustion. This is due to the fact that there are always residues (such as ash and liquid effluents) to be disposed off and practically in all applications there is a stack or a chimney.

Greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction is one of the most important environmental challenges for the next decades. Carbon dioxide (CO₂) is the most important greenhouse gas, representing approximately three-quarters of the total GHG emissions. Biomass strategies pose an important option for CO₂ emission reduction since CO₂ is fixed during the biomass growth stage. Biomass can subsequently be used as a renewable resource, with zero net CO₂ emissions. This is the basis for all biomass strategies (i.e. groups of activities with similar characteristics, concerning agriculture and forestry and aiming for GHG emission mitigation). The following biomass strategies can be discerned:  

Biomass currently supplies about a third of the developing countries’ energy varying from about 90% in countries like Uganda, Rawanda and Tanzania, to 45 percent in India, 30 percent in China and Brazil and 10-15 percent in Mexico and South Africa. The crucial questions are whether the two billion or more people who are now dependent on biomass for energy will increase. The fact that 90 percent of the worlds population will reside in developing countries by about 2050 probably implies that biomass energy will e with us forever.

Ashwani Kumar

The state of Rajasthan is situated between 23°3’N and 30°12’ N latitude and 69°30’ and  78°17’  E longitude. The total land area of the state is about 3,42,239 km2, out of which about 1,96,150 km2  is arid and rest is semi-arid. This arid and semi-arid wasteland of is rich in biodiversity. During present investigation studies were conducted on characterization of bio-energy resources in the semi arid region of Rajasthan.