GERES, Cambodia, Efficient charcoal cooking stoves - Ashden Award winner

This video can be downloaded here: http://www.ashdenawards.org/winners/geres GERES won an Ashden Award for Sustainable Energy in 2006.

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The Groupe Energies Renouvelables, Environnement et Solidarités (GERES) set up the Cambodian Fuelwood Saving Project (CFSP) which has developed a cheap charcoal stove, the 'New Lao' stove. This uses at least 22% less charcoal than the 'Traditional Lao' stoves which are commonly used in Cambodia. More than 130,000 New Lao stoves have been produced by 14 entrepreneurs and sold in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, over the past three years.

About 95% of Cambodians cook with biomass fuels. This is costly, has adverse health effects and is bad for the environment. Cambodia's great natural biodiversity is threatened by uncontrolled wood consumption. Much of this demand is for timber and a significant amount is turned into charcoal which is the preferred cooking fuel in cities, used by 40% of the population of Phnom Penh. The area of forest is diminishing but the price of charcoal has hardly increased over the last ten years, reflecting a thriving (but largely illegal) trade, and lack of taxes and other constraining factors.

One way of reducing the unsustainable wood consumption is by reducing the demand for charcoal. CFSP have worked with stove users and producers to develop a stove which is more efficient and durable than the conventional bucket-type stoves because of better insulation and controlled air flow. More than 130,000 New Lao stoves have now been sold. The 14 producers work to strict quality standards and are currently producing about 7,000 stoves per month. Although a New Lao stove costs about three times as much as a traditional stove, users are willing to pay for one because they recoup the difference in price within two months through savings on the purchase of charcoal. A network of distributors and retailers has been established and a trade organisation set up that oversees pricing and quality.

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• GERES
• Cambodia
• Efficient
• improved
• charcoal
• cooking
• stove
• ashden
• awards
• sustainable
• energy
• CFSP

[TheBgcheez]

I've been looking every where for these in the States and came across a company in California but their prices are to high. I went to a Vietnamese market last week and they were telling me that they would like these here to. So can anyone tell me who would import these and or who may have these for sell here in the States? I can market and sell these if anyone wants to contact me to discuss please do.

[AshdenAwards]

@TheBgcheez You could contact GERES and ask them. Their contact details are in the case study on the Ashden Awards website.

[2vsme]

hellow? i will just ask if there is different designs

[AshdenAwards]

There was just one design at the time of the award, though they may have developed other designs since.

[TheBgcheez]

@AshdenAwards - Thank you

[cdltpx]

greenpowerscience just did an experiment where he sank his low budget solar panel in an aquarium increasing output 9%. This would make those less expensive panels a great option to those in areas where they might be prone to use charcoal . With low cost laptops and solar tech 3 world nations have an opportunity as never before.energy should be free and one day it will nearly be.

[MrBillTroop73]

This seems to be a variation on the Rocket Stove design that has been around for years now.

Its still not as efficient as it could be, because it doesnt use residual stove heat to preheat the combustion air.

My Binchotan stove does just that, uses residual stove heat to preheat the incoming combustion air, and its 2 parts simple and FREE.

Bill

[cdltpx]

What about solar ovens they do work too. At night use solar charged batteries to convert water to browns gas and use alcohol with browns gas to cook. I tried the solar oven both fresnell and box ovens. As for the browns gas I have to work on that I just found out about doing this with 3 9 volt batteries.

[buttkracken]

This is beautiful, continue for us all.