<
https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2024/08/24/carbon-credits-cook-stoves-africa/>
"SANSÃO MUTHEMBA, Mozambique — The simple stoves were being shipped out across
Africa by the millions, and few people here saw the downside. The stoves were
free. They were pitched as an upgrade to the charcoal grill and wood campfire
cooking methods in the area. And they promised solutions to the massive
problems of deforestation and smoke pollution.
But as the stoves were handed out in this part of Mozambique in 2021, Victoria
Jose Arriscado said she was struck by how cheap they looked — just a few metal
parts atop clay bricks and mud.
When she used it, her home filled with smoke, and her eyes teared up.
“This is clearly not the best they could do,” Arriscado, 43, remembered
thinking.
Arriscado and others had received the stoves as part of a program run by
D.C.-based C-Quest Capital, a producer of carbon credits — specialized
investments that some of the world’s largest companies buy to offset their
planet-warming emissions. The company distributes stoves that it says are more
efficient than traditional campfires, reducing the amount of wood burned and
protecting users’ lungs. The company calculates the reduction in emissions,
turns that into a commodity, and sells it to companies, which then claim their
operations are contributing less to climate change.
But C-Quest’s program in Mozambique — marketed as a climate solution that also
produces a better life for impoverished Africans — failed to deliver on either
pledge, according to an investigation by
The Washington Post.
The inquiry shows how, in this area of Mozambique, the pressure to produce
carbon credits at a low cost led the company to cut corners in a way that
ultimately backfired on the people it was trying to help.
Most directly, C-Quest failed to take steps to ensure that its clay and metal
cookstoves were being widely used and working properly, critical to ensuring
that the project was reducing greenhouse gas emissions and deforestation.
Because the stoves were vulnerable to rain, some villagers — who’d cooked
outdoors before the project — placed their devices indoors, in areas with poor
ventilation, probably increasing their exposure to dangerous air pollution.
Meanwhile, the company claimed on official paperwork that the stoves were being
used by every household participating in the program, a claim that cannot be
verified on the ground.
“They came, they left the [stove] kits, and they never came back,” said Pedro
Marizane Juga, the chief leader in the community."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
