Our mission is to conserve fuel, lessen women's labor, eliminate indoor air pollution, and decrease carbon emissions by helping people in remote villages design and install better wood stoves. We also recognize their effort and achievement by providing them with solar energy systems for lighting, cell phone charging, and radio operation.
We have also worked in science, math, and environmental education in East Africa for many years, and find the stove development and solar energy a rich opportunity to create living curriculum based on village experience that can enliven remote schools.
Our organization has worked with women's groups to dig wells, start businesses, and strengthen communities in Zanzibar as well.
Contact Information
Our Focus
Our present largest effort is with the Maasai of Tanzania. Their homes are the smokiest and darkest we have observed in Africa. With them, we have designed a very successful stove that cuts wood use in half, gets smoke out of the house, cooks quickly, and is liked by Maasai women. We at this time are working with three villages in the Monduli Mountains of Tanzania, northwest of Arusha, but the benefits of this work should be spread to the half million Maasai living under unhealthy conditions of indoor pollution in Tanzania and Kenya.
Our Experience And Interest In The Four PCIA Central Focus Areas
Because our work does not touch directly any of the cultural practices of the Maasai that are culturally sensitive, and the benefits of smoke removal and light are obvious to the people, especially the mothers, school teachers, and community leaders, we have found no barriers to our work.
The stove we have designed is based entirely on materials obtained in the local towns. There is some metal working to do, and certainly materials supply like cement, bricks, tools, and so forth to be purchased. Therefore, local businesses and mechanics are deeply involved in the work. There will develop needs for maintenance, cleaning, and parts replacement which will become opportunities for enterprise as the project spreads.
Our stove firebox and chimney solve the problem of balancing smoke removal with efficiency in a very effective way. While the general idea, keep the fire circulating and the gases and smoke burning near the cooking areas as long as possible, and still get it to the draft up the chimney before smoke escapes into the house, is associated with many designs, we do think we have a unique, successful and simple solution that can be standardized, produced, and distributed.
We are collecting data, measuring air quality and wood consumption, and training women in the Maasai bomas to install, tune, and popularize the stoves and solar systems. We will continue monitoring as we spread the program. It is necessary to monitor carefully so that the aspects of the stove design that make it a success do not get lost with replication.
Relevant Publications or Studies
None noted
Our Contribution to the Partnership
We would like to work in the field, collaborate in design and implementation, share data and design, work to direct resources toward the replication of our technical contribution and others of similar quality.
