[Stoves] Biomass briquetting tangents

[Sujoy Chaudhury]

Dear Tom

I completely agree with you, when you say that the strategy to attract
households to use an improved stove should include a strategy to support
the production and distribution of stoves that are designed locally. The
role of non-profits with continuity in personnel and support is a key
determinant for the success of this strategy. And of course these stoves
need not be tested but the community that is attempting to make a crucial
development gain including the producers and the associated non-profits,
should receive blessings and funding from the International Community.
Success lies in the fact that all elements of the process not just the
production of stoves, but the elements of pricing, promotion, marketing,
supply & delivery, after sales etc. are designed and implemented
professionally by a team and this team should necessarily be blessed and
funded by the international community. Between the producer/s and an
associated non-profit/s which makes up the  team, resources for hiring and
retaining talent is always of concern and HR support significantly
increases the likelihood of an intervention being successful.

It will perhaps be worthwhile to look at "rates of adoption" and
"continuity of use" of cook stoves for communities which have had
interventions by producers and non-profits with local stoves and those that
have received interventions by regional / international companies with
tested and standardised stoves.

Regards

Sujoy Chaudhury
Center for Sustainable Solutions
Kolkata



On Mon, Aug 14, 2017 at 1:12 AM, Tom Miles <tmiles at trmiles.com> wrote:

> When the solar energy laboratory in Mali was developing a metal jiko in
> the mid-late 1980s it became apparent that production would be limited by
> the availability of scrap steel and the logistics of sheet steel,
> especially to remote areas.
>
>
>
> We should accept a multi-tiered strategy of production at small, medium,
> and large scales.
>
>
>
> If your target is small scale there are examples of stove works that
> produce tens, hundreds, and thousands of stoves that are suited to local
> fuels, tastes, and demand. Successful producers are often supported by
> independent non-profits that have organized supply chains, and continuity
> in personnel and support. Their products sometime have not been tested, or
> they score in the middle of the field in lab tests, but they sell locally
> and are adapted to their markets. These products don’t need to be blessed
> or funded by international organizations. If they don’t sell, they fail.
> You may not get to millions with this strategy but these stoves have
> improved countless lives by improving health and providing a means for
> cooks to earn income. Many thanks to the generous and dedicated people who
> are supporting this market.
>
>
>
> Tom
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *From:* Stoves [mailto:stoves-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] *On
> Behalf Of *Crispin Pemberton-Pigott
> *Sent:* Sunday, August 13, 2017 6:20 AM
> *To:* Discussion of biomass cooking stoves <stoves at lists.bioenergylists.
> org>
> *Subject:* Re: [Stoves] Biomass briquetting tangents
>
>
>
> Dear Nikhil the persistent
>
>
>
> My analysis and actions are rooted in some fundamental concepts that
> underlie the approach to project design.
>
>
>
> It is often a desire to 'make a stove locally'. As Mark Bryden's students
> have shown, there isn't enough scrap metal in Chad to replace all the
> traditional stoves with much better ones. Even if it were all making it to
> the bazaar and not being exported ‎to China, it is not nearly enough.
> Generally the better stoves all have more material in them.
>
>
>
> So what does 'produced locally' mean? They produce their own steel sheets?
> ‎Nope. Rivets? Sort of, made from chopped off nails. Screws? No. Welding
> rods? No. Bolts? No.
>
>
>
> The point is that nearly no stove made from metal is entirely produce
> in-country. So, who decided that ‎cutting up an imported sheet is 'local'?
> Why not import the blanked parts, accurately made and mass produced? Why
> ship scrap to Chad and start cutting with a hammer and cold chisel? Makes
> no sense, as soon as one admits that the material is going to be imported
> if the 'problem' is to be addressed 'at scale'.
>
>
>
> The idea we explored with George was to try to get a finished combustion
> chamber, material and processing, to Gambia for the same cost as buying the
> raw material locally. Given the rapacious nature of the local importers,
> invariably expats from the Middle East and South Asia, this was not such a
> challenge.
>
>
>
> As to its being 'affordable' that is a question of the value proposition,
> not only the cost. As the stove lasts five years, it has additional value
> as a purchase proposition. As a fuel saver, it is also more valuable. For
> lighting speed it is probably unrivaled. Big plus. Less smoke? More
> benefit. Fuel flexible? Yup. So it is a 'good value' because the value
> proposition exceeds the cost.
>
>
>
> Accessibility is a separate issue. If the amount is too big to pay all at
> once, it needs a finance mechanism and there are lots to invoke.
>
>
>
> So I agree that the definition of 'local' is a political decision. ‎If you
> are going to send anything to a developing country, don't include any
> embedded low skilled labour. Do that on site.
>
>
>
> We had a discussion here some years ago on how to create the most stoves
> with the best performance at the least cost at the greatest speed.  ‎One
> proposal was to send Vesto combustion chambers with an additional  ring to
> hold it, and ti build a mud enclosure that created the preheating chambers
> and cooking platform.
>
>
>
> This is what happened with George except instead of mud he used locally
> available plain steel sheets which are common enough.
>
>
>
> GIZ was not involved in the project, it was a WB pilot with Concern
> International. Cecil did the stove anthropology, as usual.
>
>
>
> Local production was done with the mech tech teaching institute which had
> the necessary metal working tools. It was not artisanal. ‎It was the first
> time we tried to make Vestos outside the SA region. Sujatha at Servals in
> Chennai has made some from scratch and confirmed the high-end performance.
> It still hasn't appeared in any stove performance report from Aprovecho or
> EPA through they have each had one for years. Obviously it didn't get a
> mention by D-Lab either.
>
>
>
> NIH??
>
>
>
> Regards
>
> Crispin
>
>
>
> Crispin: (to George below)
>
> What you describe of Gadgil's - and your - work is yesteryear's. And
> probably for very unorthodox situations (Darfur) or small markets (Vesto in
> the Gambia).
>
> Conditions change. Electricity, skills, manufacturing capacity,
> restriction on imports (or preference for domestic production),
> availability of tools, Mrs. Clinton's enthusiasm and ISO globalism. As do
> the demographics (urbanization), resource availability (waste biomass)
>
> My point is that "appropriate technology" of yesteryears need not be the
> same today. The key idea you and Gadgil had was that "the ‘industrial’
> production was done as close to the bulk material source where the tooling
> could be produced and maintained."
>
> This remains valid, and is a very useful parameter for defining "context",
> the term I am obsessed with (at least in reaction to service standard and
> objective). Your recommendation also remain valid for such contexts:
>
> " *   Designed outside the region
>   *   Introduced after local testing
>   *   Main components needing high precision produced outside the country
>   *   All metal construction
>   *   Performance much better than local baseline products in common use
>   *   Production process adjusted/evolved as local capacity improved
>   *   Field performance evaluations confirm acceptance and long term use
> (displacement)
>
> It would be good if the project can be picked up again and expanded to
> include all the city neighbourhoods."
>
>
>
> In other contexts, "Design outside the region" and "all metal
> construction" need not apply, and "country" is simply a political term.
>
> These are the "data shortages" in the facts-free universe of "clean
> cookstoves" - data are contextual and there is not a single database I can
> find about the local, real facts of alleged global problems -
> deforestation, climate change, women's power, or health damage.
> (Conversely, not a single "stove rollout" has been done on the basis of
> actual local data on "before and after" efficiency, emissions, women's
> power, or long-term health.)
>
> The question is, why did GIZ effort limited in time and geography? How
> much damage has been done by the madness of pushing WBT and ISO Tiers?
> (Maybe not much; GACC increasingly looks like a sideshow.)
>
> I will now read the D-Lab report in light of your observations.
>
> George:
>
> Some questions:
>
> 1. Who is leading the external charge on SE4All when it comes to cooking
> energy? Is the emphasis only on households? This is important because if
> SE4All is aligned with UN SDGs, the goal is to reduce the "% of households
> using solid fuels for cooking".
>
> In other words, SDGs are as pernicious to use of biomass for cooking as
> WHO/ISO Tier 4 Emission Reduction Targets for PM2.5 (hourly average). I do
> not understand why this List has not reacted to this blatant betrayal of
> the "better biomass stoves" agenda.
>
> 2. Is there an evaluation of the Gambia stoves work in the past? And to
> the SE4All Investment Prospectus (likely to be heavily weighed to
> electricity)?
>
> ------
>
> Thanks, both. A breath of fresh air.
>
> Nikhil
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>
>
> On Sat, Aug 12, 2017 at 10:32 PM, Crispin Pemberton-Pigott <
> crispinpigott at outlook.com> wrote:
>
> Dear George of the J
>
> Thanks. The follow-up point I want to make is stimulated by the fact that
> your project was discussed previously and it has some aspects which
> interesting to those planning stove roll-outs in locations where the are
> manufacturing capacity or skill shortages.
>
> Quick review: at about the same time, Ashok Gadgil and I concluded that
> the way forward in places with limited manufacturing capacity was to send
> partially manufactured stoves to the site, absent only what could be made
> using the available skills and manpower. By ‘concluded’ I mean we both
> started ‘doing it’, Ashok in Darfur and you with me in the Gambia. At the
> time Ashok and I have not met or communicated – we only found each other
> later and got on like a house on fire.
>
> While it has probably been done before, we didn’t have examples. The plan
> was to make the combustion chambers for Vesto stoves and send them to you,
> with all the rest of the stove made locally from available sheet metal. The
> result was a locally fabricated Vesto Junior that has the same performance
> as a product made in Swaziland.
>
> Ashok for his part, produced ‘blanked’ parts in India and sent them to
> Darfur for assemble in a workshop that had no electricity – just hand
> tools, initially. Later they added some welding to further improve the
> product.
>
> The common elements were that the ‘industrial’ production was done as
> close to the bulk material source where the tooling could be produced and
> maintained. In the case of the Darfur stove it was blanking tools. For
> those who don’t know the term, it is punching tools that typically have a
> very small vertical movement, used to create a shape out of a flat sheet.
> It can also be done by laser or plasma cutter, but when volume is involved,
> press tools are made that punch the whole part at once at very low cost.
> There was no way that could be run and maintained in Darfur.
>
> With Banjul, the challenge was similar. There is a mechanical training
> centre with limited cutting and welding facility but no laser cutting or
> CNC punching capability. The grate on the Vesto needs three press tools to
> make, including a complicated blanking tool. So the combustion chamber with
> scores of holes and the grate were produced in Johannesburg – at the
> contractor that does the CNC work and the SeTAR Centre’s stove development
> workshop at the University of Johannesburg. That facility was equipped by
> ProBEC/GIZ in its last days.
>
> At the time the goal in the Gambia was to produce locally a high
> performance stove that could burn briquettes made for available waste
> materials, which is a fuel a Vesto is able deal with quite well. The
> initial target was to make it to last five years, and it is heartening to
> hear that indeed these stoves have endured that long. Given that there is
> no ceramic component in them, perhaps designers can learn from the
> experiment. It is an all-metal stove like the Darfur Stove.  They two
> products have little else in common as to how they work, but they do share
> these:
>
>
>   *   Designed outside the region
>   *   Introduced after local testing
>   *   Main components needing high precision produced outside the country
>   *   All metal construction
>   *   Performance much better than local baseline products in common use
>   *   Production process adjusted/evolved as local capacity improved
>   *   Field performance evaluations confirm acceptance and long term use
> (displacement)
>
> It would be good if the project can be picked up again and expanded to
> include all the city neighbourhoods.
>
> Many thanks
> Crispin
>
>
>
> Crispin.
>
> Sorry my mistake. Maybe of interest to a wider audience. Even way back I
> always thought that your stove designs never got enough mention. Feedback
> from the grassroots. After the rains hopefully our economic situation has
> improved enough so we can go back to the 23 families and do a quick survey.
>
> George
>
>
> From: Crispin Pemberton-Pigott [mailto:crispinpigott at outlook.com]
> Sent: 12 August 2017 17:57
> To: icecool; George Riegg Gambia
> Subject: RE: [Stoves] Biomass briquetting tangents
>
> Did you want this to go to the Discussion list?
>
> I’d be happy to respond there.
> Crispin
>
>
> Nikhil and Crispin,
>
> Ebola only affected us here economically. Total collapse of tourism, still
> trying to recover now. At the time restricted movements of goods as borders
> were almost closed for some months – high prices for scarce products. We
> laid in boxes of tinned sardines and other tinned stuff and went into lock
> down mode for about 3 month – only fresh daily bread. In the end I think
> they traced the virus back to some monkeys in Niger or there abouts – yes
> bush meet played a big part and the eradication of forests…
>
> Crispin. Our 23 Furno Ees are still working great for the “test” families
> – nearly 5 years on. 2 ½ years ago we had a SE4ALL validation workshop here
> and both the Furno and the Briquetting were included in the Governments
> priority initiatives and the Investment Prospectus. Now with the new people
> in Government hopefully more positive actions will happen in time. We also
> had some serious funding problems with getting messed around by some
> implementing partners in charge of purse strings – we never made it away
> from the 1 tin of sardines per day. Amazing what you can do with that!
>
> Watch this space ☺ There is still spank in this old geezer!
>
> George
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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