[Stoves] things rattling in my brain after ETHOS

[Otto Formo]

Dear Erin,
Nice to hear about different experiences from Africa and improved stoves.
Just a few comments:
1. Yes, people or women "loves" charcoal in Africa (and Haiti) and thats why we are trying to convince them about other alternatives. During our demonstrations of the gasifier, Peko Pe, in Zambia using Corn cobs as fuel, people kept on asking:
"Can we use charcoal, as well?" AND we had to keep on saying:
"The gasfier produces charcoal, so whats the point?"
Since they are so focused on charcoal, we recomended to utillize the gases in the Corn cobs for cooking in the gasifier (1/2 hour) and empty the char into the locally made Mbawula (US$ 1-5, Charcoalstove) for another hour of cooking or simmering. It worked out very well. 
I would guess that the stove metioned, could be the SAVE 80?
Why?, because its looks very nice (stainless steel) and are very expencive (more than US$ 100) and is fueled by woodchips. Normaly this would be a stove for peri- and urban settings, due to the costs and whom normaly uses charcoal as fuel. Low income, rural households uses mainly three stone fire and firewood.
2. Yes, and I still feel sorry for them, but they are not stupid.
If people are given alternatives and sensible options, like the combination of a durable gasifier and a low cost charcoal stove, we feel it will work out nicely.
Our experience is that charcoal is considered as the "only" option in urban settings, due to the fact that hardly any other type of biomass or suitable stoves are available. 
There are a LOT of biomass from agri- forest waste, just a matter to make it available for peri- and urban settings, like charcoal of to day. 
Using pellets, you can extend the cooking time 3-4 times.
3. In Zambia most pots are less than 5 L in a rural setting.
When we are talking about 20 L or more, we need to make permanent cooking stands, just like for institutional kitchens.

Have a nice day.

Otto

> From: Erin Rasmussen [erin at trmiles.com]
> Sent: 2012-02-01 04:42:36 MET
> To: stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org
> Subject: [Stoves] things rattling in my brain after ETHOS
> 
> 
> In chatting with  people who who had been doing work in Africa, I learned some pretty interesting tidbits this weekend that I'm just noting down here before I forget. 
> 
>  1- We were taking a look at some pictures of beautiful improved stoves that had signs of terrible smoke and high heat damage, and were trying to figure it out, when this story emerged from the field. It turns out that the ladies in that village LOVE their new stove, they use it with wood and other biomass to cook dinner and then they pack it full of charcoal and drag it indoors to keep the 'house' warm all night.  These stoves with combustion chambers tuned for wood, were starting to fall apart after being used as charcoal braziers every night. 
> 
> 2 - the African ladies LOVE the charcoal stoves (see 1), another reason for this is fairly obvious to anyone that's tried to cook beans over a hot, fast fire.  Beans and other grains and pulses cook best with a long slow heat, after a few minutes of a fairly intense boil.  So one sound approach would be to help them with a better biomass attachment to the regular charcoal stove, or a better charcoal.  Teddy in Kenya recommends a more efficient  biochar retort, and Paul has the T-Char. I think both are good approaches, but I tend to think that these problems are large enough that there's plenty of room for multiple solutions. There may be better ideas too, what do you all think? 
> 
> 3 - To quote Christa Roth: "Women in Senegal use a 20 L pot. Deal with it."  There are some great small stoves, and there are some great institutional stoves, but we need something for the family of 8.  Obviously, most ladies would prefer to have multiple small stoves in the household, but there are some people with big families, and it would be nice to have a good solution for them. 
>  
> Erin Rasmussen
> Biomass Stoves discussion list
> erin at trmiles.com
> 
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