Throughout Central America, more than 80% of families cook their meals over open wood fires. These families don't have access to alternative fuel sources and can't afford to buy electric or gas stoves. These open wood fires create serious problems:

• Smoke from these fires is a major cause of acute respiratory infections, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, tuberculosis, and eye diseases;


• Inefficient open wood fires require a great deal of fuel, contributing to deforestation;


• Open-fire cooking stoves, because they require a great deal of wood, release carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere; and


• Women cooking over an open fire and children playing nearby run the risk of being seriously burned.

To combat these problems, TWP and the Aprovecho Research Center have developed several types of fuel-efficient stoves that use up to 70% less wood than traditional open fire stoves. The technology behind the stoves is simple and very low-maintenance, and the stoves can be manufactured locally, using local materials, and adapted to meet local cooking customs.

Combating Health & Economic Problems

Cooking over an open fire every day, in the confines of an unventilated kitchen, has been compared to smoking five packs of cigarettes a day. TWP's improved stoves include a chimney that vents smoke out of the home. Emissions testing conducted on our stoves indicates that the chimney, by removing the toxic smoke, also reduces carbon monoxide and particulate matter by more than 80%. Improved stoves are also safer, greatly reducing the risk of burns, especially in small children.

TWP's improved stoves also help families economically. In Guatemala, for example, the fuel-efficiency of our stoves translates into an average cost savings of $10.50 a month per family (from an average income of less than $100/month; 70% of the population of Guatemala earns less than $2/day). Commercial tortilla makers in Nicaragua who use the improved stoves can re-invest the money they save into their businesses.

Reducing Global Warming and Deforestation

Each of our forest-saving, fuel-efficient stoves saves an average of 1 ton of carbon emissions per year. Over the stove's minimum projected lifespan of 5 years, that translates into a savings of 5 tons of carbon dioxide. The stoves also benefit whole communities by reducing deforestation, which in turn can help prevent erosion and landslides, and protect water supplies.

TWP and our local partners have built more than 20,000 fuel-efficient stoves in Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Guatemala. In 2003 we also began introducing the stoves in Mexico, Brazil, and Bolivia, and in 2007 we began building stoves in Haiti. TWP received the prestigious Ashden Award for Sustainable Energy in 2005 and a $132,000 grant in 2006 from the US Environmental Protection Agency to expand our successful micro-enterprise stove project in Honduras.

Key to the stove programs' success is training local people how to build, use, and maintain the stoves themselves. Once one stove is built in a community, word spreads quickly, and it's not uncommon to have waiting lists of women eager for the benefits the stoves offer.

TWP's fuel-efficient stoves are a great example of sustainable, appropriate technology that helps both people and their environment.