This is one initiative I am keen on succeed at the fastest possible pace.
In India alone, over 80,000 villagers die every year from lung diseases as a result of cooking with kerosene stoves.
Just imagine what a simple switch to clean cookstoves could do to reverse this ridiculous and totally unnecessary mortality.
The alliance is “a public-private initiative to save lives, improve livelihoods, empower women, and combat climate change by creating a thriving global market for clean and efficient household cooking solutions.”
And these are interesting folks at the alliance, they have even managed to get Julia Roberts (yes, the Julia Roberts), as their Ambassador.
In addition to hoping that these guys succeed phenomenally well, I also am confident that they will – my personal opinion is that these domains within cleantech that serve a dire need in an affordable manner have much higher and faster chances of success than trying to put up solar panels on rooftops when the building gets power 23 hours a day. Mind you, I am all for solar, just trying to compare two situations – one where a dire need exists (a must have) and another in which the need is marginal (nice to have)
Let’s hope and encourage these nice folks at the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves all the best