US company to introduce environmentally-friendly stoves

Enviro Fuels Manufacturing Inc, a company based in Florida, USA will soon introduce environmentally friendly fuel cooking stoves.The company’s president and CEO, Larry Hunt, said this yesterday after demonstrating the efficiency of the stoves to various stakeholders in the energy sector.

Thursday, June 09, 2011
Rick Guthrie cooks to demonstrate how the enviro fuels stove works. (Photo J Mbanda)

Enviro Fuels Manufacturing Inc, a company based in Florida, USA will soon introduce environmentally friendly fuel cooking stoves.

The company’s president and CEO, Larry Hunt, said this yesterday after demonstrating the efficiency of the stoves to various stakeholders in the energy sector.

The stove is designed to burn coal in an environmentally sensitive, cost effective, and efficient way. It is easy to use and enables people to prepare daily meals quickly using familiar cooking methods.

"Enviro-Fuels Stove will help to reduce the amount of fuels used in homes and they would be able to save on their energy budget and at the same time lessen the rate at which the environment is degraded,” Hunt said.

He added that the stove requires 10 ounces of coal to provide enough heat to cook one meal for a family, as its unique interior design directs all heat to the cooking surface.

"We have taken samples of peat from Rwanda and we are going to find out if it can be used to provide heat to stoves while cooking. This will reduce the cost of importing coal pellets that are burned in the stove,” he said.

Hunt explained that the Enviro Fuels Stove produces burner temperatures in excess of 500 degrees Celsius while it remains safe to the touch and water boils in as few as nine minutes. The stove is designed to light with a match.

It  is built to last for over 25 years and is made from stainless steel and is capable of producing electricity from the heat of the stove by adding an Enviro Fuels designed thermo-electric generator.

He said that the stove costs $92 adding that a large number of potential African beneficiaries can afford to purchase them.

"We have already launched it in DRC, Nigeria, and Tanzania and we are continuing to introduce it in other African countries,” Hunt noted.

Eng. Yussuf Uwamahoro, who is in charge of energy at the Energy, Water and Sanitation Authority (EWSA) said that the stove is in line with government’s vision.

"85 percent of our population depends on biomass as a source of energy; four percent depend on electricity and 11 percent on other oil products. With the introduction of Enviro Fuels Stove we shall reduce the use of charcoal burning stoves,” he explained.

Uwamahoro stated that the cost of the stove is still high for the ordinary Rwandan but after introducing the use of peat for burning the stove, the price will go down.

"Our target is to reduce biomass consumption to 50 percent by 2020 and we are looking at number of ways how we can condense it,” he noted.

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