In the Tiruppur manual's fuel table, which fuel is cheapest per unit of heat, and which does its dye house table burn?
The Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) Tiruppur manual's fuel table gives coconut husk about rupees (Rs) 500 per million kilocalories (kcal), firewood Rs 789, furnace oil Rs 3,011, liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) Rs 3,750 and diesel Rs 4,500. Its dye house tables burn 4,000 and 3,800 kcal a kilogram (kg), which fits husk and firewood.
The fuel table
- Firewood Rs 3 a kg, 3,800 kcal a kg. Coconut husk Rs 2 a kg, 4,000. Furnace oil Rs 28 a kg, 9,300. LPG Rs 33 a kg, 8,800. High speed diesel (HSD) Rs 45 a litre, 10,000 kcal a litre.
- Prices are the manual's landed prices and the heating values its gross calorific values, in a manual dated 2011.
Rupees per million kcal
Price divided by heating value, times a million: husk 2 / 4,000 = Rs 500; firewood 3 / 3,800 = Rs 789; furnace oil 28 / 9,300 = Rs 3,011; LPG 33 / 8,800 = Rs 3,750; diesel 45 / 10,000 = Rs 4,500.
Against firewood: husk costs 63% as much per unit of heat, furnace oil 3.8 times, LPG 4.8 times and diesel 5.7 times. The manual says units lean on diesel generators during power cuts, which it calls costly.
Carbon dioxide (CO2): diesel at 2.645 kg a litre is 264.5 kg per million kcal at the manual's 10,000 kcal. Wood and husk are counted separately from the grid and fossil lines.
Which fuel the dye house tables burn
The manual's sample dye houses give fuel in tonnes and heat in lakh kcal (1 lakh = 100,000). Unit 1: 41,600 lakh kcal for 1,040 tonnes is 4,000 kcal a kg, the husk row. Unit 2: 120,384 for 3,168 is 3,800, the firewood row. No oil or gas row comes near. The tables do not name the fuel, so this is our reading from the heating values.
Table 2.11 does not say which fuel its Rs 3 a kg describes; Rs 3 is the firewood price in Table 2.5.
Using it
- Keep wood, husk and oil on separate invoice lines, with weight, so the heating value and CO2 can be set for each.
- Redo rupees per million kcal with this month's delivered price and your supplier's heating value. Moisture changes both.
- Cheapest per kcal is not the whole case: ash, feeding labour and the boiler's efficiency on that fuel differ.
Rupees per million kcal, from the table
- Husk: 2 / 4,000 x 1,000,000 = Rs 500
- Firewood: 3 / 3,800 x 1,000,000 = Rs 789
- Furnace oil: 28 / 9,300 x 1,000,000 = Rs 3,011
- Diesel: 45 / 10,000 x 1,000,000 = Rs 4,500; CO2 2.645 / 10,000 x 1,000,000 = 264.5 kg
- Unit 1: 41,600 lakh kcal / 1,040 t = 40 lakh kcal a t = 4,000 kcal a kg
Prices and heating values are the manual's figures, dated 2011. Costs per heat and the fuel reading are our arithmetic.
What Senseible does here
Senseible reads fuel invoices and electricity bills into monthly records. A fuel with no sourced factor is shown as missing, not filled. It does not read heating values; those come from your supplier.
Sources: BEE, Manual on Energy Conservation Measures in Textile Cluster, Tirupur (SAMEEEKSHA)
Last reviewed 2026-11-06. Prices are the manual's landed prices, dated 2011; use your current invoices.