U.S. Embassy partners with Fulbright Scholar to showcase how efficient cook stoves reduce pollution, save fuel

The U.S. Embassy in Addis Ababa partnered with U.S. Fulbright Scholar, Professor Tsegaye Nega, to host a demonstration event to showcase efficient cook stoves that can eliminate more than 95% of indoor air pollution and reduce fuel requirements by 90%. In addition to cooking, the stoves can also be used to light a room or charge a cell phone.
Every year over 60,000 people, mostly women and children die in Ethiopia because of indoor air pollution arising from the use of solid fuels (i.e., wood, cow dung, crop residue, and charcoal) for cooking and heating using open fires or traditional stoves. Another 5 million suffer respiratory diseases. The environmental impact of these activities is equally serious: to supply charcoal to urban areas of Ethiopia alone, the equivalent of approximately 29,000 hectares of forest is cleared every year. This is the same as the combined areas of Bole, Akaki, Addis Ketema, Arada, and Gulele sub cities of Addis Ababa.
On August 1st, 2018, Professor Nega and his colleagues launched a field test of what they call the “stove + pellets + charcoal buyback” business model in Addis Ababa. This three-prong approach seeks to demonstrate that more efficient cookstoves make economic.