Burn Design Lab produces customized stove designs that meet the unique cooking needs of each developing community. We develop sustainable distribution systems that have a profound impact on deforestation, indoor air quality, and women's health. At our research center in Washington State our goal is to design, construct, and test prototypes as well as the tooling required to build the stoves in country. It is our belief that cookstove projects must be commercially viable to achieve long-term success.
Rocketstove.org is a volunteer run website that offers step-by-step plans for constructing household stoves, food dryers, institutional stoves, and bread ovens.
Contact Information
Our Focus
Our goal is to work with implementing organizations to develop local mass production of fuel-efficient cookstoves. We are currently partnering with the Paradigm Project to develop a new charcoal stove for Haiti. In 2011 we will build on the success of our earlier collaboration - mass production of the Jiko Poa in Kenya - to include Ethiopia, Tanzania, and eventually, all of central Africa. Last year we placed 10 interns in the field in Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, and the United States. This year we intend to place 5 interns in the US and 10 interns abroad to assist in the mass production of household and institutional stoves.
Our Experience And Interest In The Four PCIA Central Focus Areas
In many countries there is a strong bias towards using charcoal even if it is more expensive than wood or LPG. Conventional wisdom says that cooks will not shift from charcoal to wood. In Kenya, we have shown that women will happily move from charcoal to wood if they are given a high-quality, clean burning and affordable stove. Cooks in the developing world, as in the developed world, want to buy and use an attractive modern cooking device.
We believe that periurban consumers should be targeted as they often use a mixture of fuels (gas, charcoal, wood) and are therefore open to fuel switching. Furthermore, since they pay for their fuel, they have a strong incentive and ability to purchase fuel-efficient appliances.
Mass production requires proper tooling, standardization and strict quality control. None of these are possible without sufficient capital. It is very difficult to achieve standardization if using a small scale artisanal approach.
Our organization is not currently involved in monitoring.
Relevant Publications or Studies
None noted
Our Contribution to the Partnership
Share our latest projects: the development of a locally-produced institutional rocket stove with chimney; mass-produced household rocket stove for Kenya; and new charcoal stove prototype for Haiti. Provide guidelines and insights for those wishing to develop institutional rocket stove projects.
