Abstract: The rate of deforestation and forest degradation has risen rapidly in Kenya leading to emergence of small scale and medium scale enterprises on charcoal briquetting technology for biocharcoal making for household use. However, there is lack of information on costs and benefits of making charcoal briquettes using low cost motorized screw press. This study focuses on cost benefit analysis of charcoal briquette making using locally designed and fabricated screw press machine. The parameters used to assess economic viability of making charcoal briquettes as a business are Total Investment Required, Cost of Production, Net Present Value (NPV) and Internal Rate of Return (IRR). It was found that the economic viability of briquetting technology is dependent on the type of equipment used for drying and processing materials, the type of biomass used and their physico-chemical and thermal properties and the skills of human resource both at technical and business level as well as investment capital.

Keywords: Charcoal briquettes, cost-benefit analysis, net present value, internal rate of return.

| DOI: 10.17148/IARJSET.2018.569