The metal container modified cooking stove
Rural India is well known to be heavily dependent on biomass based systems for its daily sustenance. Cooking is one single activity that accounts for about ninety percent of the total domestic energy demand or usage.
There is also the regional factor that plays an important role in this type of work that consumes more natural resource for energy generation. States and places which are in the upper reaches of the country experience severe temperature drops during the winter season and is yet not cold during rest of the year. Such places also consume the natural resource for generation of heat to keep the cold off.
Projects involving some villages of the northern reaches of India were taken up for implementing energy saving as well as using alternate source of energy. The demand on firewood in these regions was so high that deforestation was taking at rapid rate. Both for cooking and for generating heat, trees were felled. The secondary effect that was noticed in these areas was the pollution that the burnt firewood produced inside the rooms.
The project therefore was aimed at providing energy intervention to integrate with development of these areas.
It was found that the locales used a three-pot mud cook stove for their living. The stoves had very low thermal efficiency being made of mud and stone and also with no chimney the pollution spread was also equally abundant. Wood was being used in these places for energy generation.
The solution for addressing both these issues was found in the development of a modified stove which had two metal water tanks embedded inside the firebox. The tanks are connected to an overhead water tank. The tanks get heated while cooking is being carried out and this hot water is thereafter is available for use. It was found that not only cooking time improved but also there was a great reduction in firewood required for both the task.
Now, such a process is being followed mainly in the rural areas. However, if this type of a system is widely adopted, for example by people in urban areas too, then it can help in containing pollution even more.
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