Management of Carbon Dioxide from Tourism Vehicles in Doi Inthanon National Park

Abstract

There were three objectives to this research in the Doi Inthanon National Park: first to study the number of vehicles and the ways that the tourists were using them to travel; second, to study the average emission of carbon dioxide (CO₂) from the tourists’ vehicles; and finally, to find a way to decrease CO₂ emissions from tourists’ vehicles in the Park. The focusing was on tourists who did not stay overnight. A questionaire was used to collect the information, with tourists asked about the vehicles they used during the weekend (Saturday and Sunday). Then, the CO₂ calculation was determined using the CO₂ emission per liter of fuel. The results revealed that the total number of tourist vehicles (6,689) could be divided into four classes: vans 33.95%, cars 30.27%, pickups 22.55% and multi-purpose pickups 13.23%. Of the tourists’ vehicles, 6,141 (91.81%) travelled to the top of Doi Inthanon. According to the research on vehicles used by tourists only there for a day trip, vans released the most CO₂ emissions and cars the least. On average, there were 4,423.93 kg CO₂ released daily. Furthermore, if all tourists used the service vehicles under the following options: 1) Doi Inthanon pickup, 2) Doi Inthanon pickup 50% and Doi Inthanons van 50%; and 3) Doi Inthanon van, then the CO₂ emissions on average would be 2,356.12, 2,388.78, and 2,421.44 kg CO₂/day, respectively. These results showed that CO₂ emission would be decreased by 46.74, 46.00, and 45.27%, respectively.

Keywords: Carbon dioxide from tourism vehicles, Doi Inthanon National Park