Mali – Clearing the air over clean cookstoves. DEMAND, 1(1) 2013.
Nathan Johnson, et al.
This article starts on page 8 of the DEMAND journal.
Not a single woman owned only improved cookstoves — one of several strong indicators that improved cookstoves do not address all cooking needs in the study village.
It’s common for women within the same family to have separate kitchens and cookstoves.
Cookstove portability is important. Women prefer to cook meals inside the kitchen and heat water outside the kitchen. Further, approximately 10% of the village travels to hamlets during the farming season and would be unable to transport stationary cookstoves installed into kitchens
Access to Clean Lighting and its Impact on Children: An Exploration of SolarAid’s SunnyMoney, 2013. Child Impact Case Study No. 4. Ann Arbor: The William Davidson Institute.
Esper, H., London, T. and Kanchwala, Y.
Increases in Wealth: Once the lamp is purchased, increased savings from reduced kerosene expenditures and kerosene-related medical expenses can be redirected to children’s needs such as nutrition and education.
Improved physical health: Reduced exposure to kerosene-based lighting reduces the risk of respiratory illnesses and burns, and puts less strain on children’s eyes.
Improved home environment: Solar lamps reduce the chance of household fires (as compared to kerosene-based lighting).
Increases in Wealth: Once the lamp is purchased, increased savings from reduced kerosene expenditures and kerosene-related medical expenses can be redirected to children’s needs such as nutrition and education.
Enablers and Barriers to Large-Scale Uptake of Improved Solid Fuel Stoves: A Systematic Review. Environmental Health Perspectives, Dec 2013. Eva A. Rehfuess, et al. E-mail: rehfuess@ibe.med.unimuenchen.de
Background: Globally, 2.8 billion people rely on household solid fuels. Reducing the resulting adverse health, environmental and development consequences will involve transitioning through a mix of clean fuels and improved solid fuel stoves (IS) of demonstrable effectiveness. To date, achieving uptake of IS has presented significant challenges.
Objectives: Conduct a systematic review of factors enabling or limiting large-scale uptake of IS.
Methods: Systematic searches were conducted through multi-disciplinary databases, specialist websites and contacting experts. The review drew on qualitative, quantitative and case studies, with standardized methods for screening, data extraction, critical appraisal and synthesis. Findings were summarized as “factors”, each relating to one of seven domains (households and settings; knowledge and perceptions; fuel and technology; finance, tax and subsidy; market development; regulation and standards; programmatic and policy mechanisms). Issues impacting equity were recorded.
Results: A total of 31 factors influencing uptake were identified from 57 studies conducted in Asia, Africa and Latin America. All domains matter: while factors such as offering technologies that meet household needs and save fuel, user training and support, effective financing and facilitative government action appear critical for success, none guarantee this, and all factors can be influential depending on context. The nature of available evidence did not permit further prioritization.
Conclusions: Achieving adoption and sustained use of IS at scale requires that all factors, spanning household/community and programme/societal levels, be assessed and supported by policy; proposals are made for a planning tool to aid this process and for further research which should incorporate effectiveness evaluation.
Diffusion of non-traditional cookstoves across western Honduras: A social network analysis. Energy Policy, Dec 2013. Sebastian Ramireza, et al.
A third of the world’s population uses inefficient biomass stoves, contributing to severe health problems, forest degradation, and climate change. Clean burning, fuel-efficient, non-traditional cookstoves (NTCS) are a promising solution; however, numerous projects fail during the diffusion process. We use social network analysis to reveal patterns driving a successful stove intervention in western Honduras. The intervention lacks formal marketing, but has spread across a wide area in just a few years. To understand the process, we map the social network of active community members who drove diffusion across a large swath of the country.
We find that most ACMs heard about stoves twice before sharing information about it with others and introducing the stove into their own communities. On average, the social distance between ACMs and the project team is 3 degrees of separation. Both men and women are critical to the diffusion process, but men tend to communicate over longer distances, while women principally communicate over shorter distances. Government officials are also crucial to diffusion. Understanding how information moves through social networks and across geographic space allows us to theorize how knowledge about beneficial technologies spreads in the absence of formal marketing and inform policies for NTCS deployment worldwide.
Sparking Change: Ideas for Transforming the Clean Cooking Market in India, 2013. Lambe, Fiona; et al. Stockholm Environment Institute.
This policy brief presents key findings of a survey of the “clean cooking” sector in India, looking at the processes that typically underpin successful markets, and for new policy responses that could kickstart the market for improved cookstoves and cleaner-burning fuels.
Millions of households in India still rely on inefficient, smoky traditional biomass stoves for their daily cooking needs. Despite this huge potential market for more fuel-efficient, cleaner-burning cookstoves and fuels, and more than three decades of government support, sales of clean cooking products are meagre and the sector is critically weak.
In 2012, researchers from SEI and the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi carried out a survey of key actors in the clean cooking sector in Delhi to gain a better understanding of what was going wrong, and to seek possible ways to stimulate the market. They applied a technical innovations system approach, looking at how the sector is structured, what rules govern it, and what was the status of a range of concurrent and mutually reinforcing processes that are needed to underpin a vibrant, self-sustaining commercial market.
This policy brief summarizes the findings of their research for a policy-making audience. It also introduces another strand of research under the project, carried out by the Department of Applied Environmental Science at Stockholm University together with the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology. This measured the contribution of biomass burning to the health- and climate-afflicting black carbon aerosols in the brown cloud of atmospheric pollution over India.
Factors Influencing ICS Adoption in Bangladesh: An Annotated Bibliography, 2013.
Compiled by Taj Sheriff/FHI360, December 2013.
This annotated bibliography contains studies and reports published from 2006 through 2013 on improved cookstove (ICS) adoption in Bangladesh. The studies discuss factors that influence the adoption of ICS. A short summary and a web link to each resource are provided below and studies are organized by publication date.
USAID Nigeria – Energy Efficient Woodstoves for Schools
Nearly all public boarding secondary schools in Nigeria use wood for cooking. About 30 million households depend solely on wood as a source of fuel for their daily cooking. According to the WHO, 95,300 deaths occur in Nigeria annually as a result of smoke from cooking with firewood. After malaria and HIV/AIDS, this is Nigeria’s third highest killer of mostly women and children. Wood use in Nigeria is predominantly through traditional three-stone fires. These fires burn wood inefficiently as most of the heat is lost to the atmosphere. This is a waste of valuable resources both in terms of forest resources, as well as the high cost of buying fuelwood.
This project will build and install clean cookstoves for schools in Cross River and Lagos States. It will build the capacity of stoves producers and help them create markets for their products. In collaboration with the state governments, the project will also help develop strategies for household energy that promotes health, saves family income, enhances environmental protection and empowers women.
This project aims to create a template for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and health risks among women by improving the efficiency of the use of fuelwood in households and institutions. It will contribute to achieving the following key Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in Cross River and Lagos States:
- Improve health among female cooks in schools and pilot households (MDG 5);
- Reduce the quantity of wood fuel used for cooking and greenhouse gas emission in participating schools and households. (MDG 7); and
- Create jobs for SMEs and marketers (MDG 1)
The project will deliver the following results:
- 80% wood energy cost savings in schools, annual emissions reductions of 6,300 tons of CO2 and 700 women achieve better respiratory health.
- At least 200 new jobs created from stove production, distribution and retailing, and SMEs empowered by a growing demand for clean cookstoves.
- New sustainable energy policy frameworks for consideration by the governments of Cross River and Lagos States
The project has three main components. These include the following:
- Stove technology development, production, installation and public awareness among students and school authorities. The project will produce and install 60 litre institutional stoves with a proven wood use efficiency of at least 80% in secondary schools and other public institutions in Cross River and Lagos states. In addition, a pilot project will be carried out to test out 100 household stoves with wood use efficiency of at least 50%. The result of this pilot will determine the feasibility of launching a major national household stove initiative. A lesson sharing workshop will be organized to educate students and staff of participating schools and the general public on the benefits of clean cookstoves.
- Technical training and development of business and marketing skills for SMEs, engagement with banks and Micro Finance Institutions. The project will build the technical and business capacity of stove producers in the states. At least 6 metal works SMEs will benefit from the training in stove design and production. By building and delivering quality stove technologies and working with Micro Finance Institutions, producers, distributors and retailers, a basis to engage with the private sector in creating a sustainable market will be established.
- Development and presentations of policy frameworks to Cross River and Lagos State Governments. In partnership with the state government, the project will develop and present policy measures that will further enhance the market for these stoves and clean energy technologies in general. By address existing technology and policy barriers, the project will set the stage to engage with the private sector and financial institutions in delivering a nationwide scale up of the market.
The project will be completed in three years (2012 to 2015).
Rethinking improved cookstove diffusion programs: A case study of social perceptions and cooking choices in rural Guatemala. Energy Policy, 23 November 2013.
Christopher Bieleck, et al.
Promoters of improved cookstoves (ICSs) argue they provide the “triple benefits” of improving health outcomes, preserving local ecosystems, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The majority of ICS research reveals a strong pro-diffusion bias toward proving these benefits. Few studies have examined ICSs from the adopters’ point-of-view.
The purpose of this case study was to describe how culture and social perceptions affect the adoption and use of ICSs. Results showed that stoves in this rural Guatemalan community had several layers of practical importance beyond cooking food. Most prominently, household members valued stoves as heat and light sources, and as a social gathering point for families. Most ICS models have been purposely designed in controlled conditions to deliver maximum heating efficiency at the lowest production cost. However, this case study revealed that the fuel-efficient designs sacrificed important functional, social, and cultural needs.
Efforts to increase adoption rates of ICSs will be more successful if the macro-level “triple benefits” paradigm is adapted to include functional consumer-centric benefits beyond heating food, such as providing heat and ambient light. Adoption programs should account for the cultural and social needs of users, such as recognizing that stoves often serve as a gathering point for families.
Founders of Envirofit International Selected as Energy and the Environment Innovators of the Year by The Economist, Nov 25, 2013.
FORT COLLINS – Tim Bauer, Nathan Lorenz and Bryan Willson, founders of Envirofit International, a company that delivers clean-burning cookstove technology to the developing world, have been named this year’s Energy and Environment Innovators by The Economist magazine, based in London.
The 10-year-old social enterprise, based in Fort Collins, Colo., was recognized for the global impact of its innovative technology and market-based delivery approach that pioneered the clean cookstove marketplace. Envirofit is the global leader in the design, development, and delivery of high performing clean energy cookstoves that that combat air pollution in developing nations. It has grown from its initial concept in the Colorado State University Engines and Energy Conversion Lab to a small pilot project in India with one stove, and from there on to become a worldwide company with multiple different models and 700,000 cookstoves sold across Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
State and national household concentrations of PM2.5 from solid cookfuel use: Results from measurements and modeling in India for estimation of the global burden of disease. Environmental Health 2013, 12:77. Kalpana Balakrishnan, et al.
Background: Previous global burden of disease (GBD) estimates for household air pollution (HAP) from solid cookfuel use were based on categorical indicators of exposure. Recent progress in GBD methodologies that use integrated–exposure–response (IER) curves for combustion particles required the development of models to quantitatively estimate average HAP levels experienced by large populations. Such models can also serve to inform public health intervention efforts. Thus, we developed a model to estimate national household concentrations of PM2.5 from solid cookfuel use in India, together with estimates for 29 states.
Methods: We monitored 24-hr household concentrations of PM2.5, in 617 rural households from 4 states in India on a cross-sectional basis between November 2004 and March 2005. We then, developed log-linear regression models that predict household concentrations as a function of multiple, independent household level variables available in national household surveys and generated national / state estimates using The Indian National Family and Health Survey (NFHS 2005).
Results: The measured mean 24-hr concentration of PM2.5 in solid cookfuel using households ranged from 163 μg/m3(95% CI: 143,183; median 106; IQR: 191) in the living area to 609 μg/m3 (95% CI: 547,671; median: 472; IQR: 734) in the kitchen area. Fuel type, kitchen type, ventilation, geographical location and cooking duration were found to be significant predictors of PM2.5 concentrations in the household model. k-fold cross validation showed a fair degree of correlation (r = 0.56) between modeled and measured values. Extrapolation of the household results by state to all solid cookfuel-using households in India, covered by NFHS 2005, resulted in a modeled estimate of 450 μg/m3 (95% CI:318,640) and 113 μg/m3 (95% CI: 102,127) , for national average 24-hr PM2.5 concentrations in the kitchen and living areas respectively.
Conclusions: The model affords substantial improvement over commonly used exposure indicators such as“percent solid cookfuel use” in HAP disease burden assessments, by providing some of the first estimates of national average HAP levels experienced in India. Model estimates also add considerable strength of evidence for framing and implementation of intervention efforts at the state and national levels.
