Energy for Sustainable Development 17 (2013) 245–251

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Energy for Sustainable Development

Sweet nectar of the Gaia: Lessons from Ethiopia's “Project Gaia”

Christopher Rogers, Benjamin K. Sovacool ⁎, Shannon ClarkeVermont Law School, Institute for Energy & the Environment, PO Box 96, 164 Chelsea Street, South Royalton, VT 05068-0444, USA

⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 802 831 1053; fax:E-mail addresses: Bsovacool@vermontlaw.edu, sovac

0973-0826/$ – see front matter © 2013 International Enhttp://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.esd.2013.02.005

a b s t r a c t

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history:Received 20 August 2012Revised 17 February 2013Accepted 18 February 2013Available online 26 March 2013

Keywords:Biofuel cookstovesRural electrificationEnergy poverty

Though initiated only at smaller scales so far, “Project Gaia” offers an innovative Ethiopian model for usingbyproducts from the sugar industry to create an ethanol fuel that can be utilized by cleaner burning cook-stoves, predominately internally displaced refugees. Backed by the Shell Foundation and a collection ofNGOs, Project Gaia has distributed almost 4000 ethanol combusting stoves throughout refugee camps in Ethio-pia. After summarizing the research methods utilized by the authors and introducing readers to the energy sit-uation in Ethiopia, this study describes the history, benefits, and challenges of Project Gaia. Though thenumber of distributed stoves is small, they have lessened the burden of collecting fuelwood for Ethiopian refu-gees, reduced deforestation around refugee camps, displaced greenhouse gas emissions, and improved thehealth of cooks and children—all for roughly one-third the cost of kerosene, the most prevalent substitute fuelfor cooking. However, if Project Gaia is to continue to deliver these benefits, a pernicious set of educational, po-litical, and logistical barriers must be overcome. The final part of the study details these barriers, and it concludesby pointing out the significance of government consistency, technological appropriateness, and the coupling ofenergy services with commercial enterprises for efforts like Project Gaia.

© 2013 International Energy Initiative. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Introduction

Ethiopia is a country characterized by untapped potential, whichpresents many opportunities for investment. With more than 87.5million people, almost twice the population of South Africa, it hasthe largest population in East Africa (Setiimi et al., 2012). When com-bined with the neighboring countries of Kenya, Sudan, South Sudan,Tanzania and Uganda, the region possesses a market potential forabout 227million consumers (Setiimi et al., 2012). Furthermore, Ethiopiahas a relatively stable political and economic environment. It is already asignatory on anumber of trade protocols, and itwill soonbecomeamem-ber of the World Trade Organization (Setiimi et al., 2012).

In terms of natural resource supplies, Ethiopia surpasses its neigh-bors. Not only does it have large fossil fuel reserves, but it has huge hy-dropower potential of which only 2% has been harnessed (Mulugetta,2008).When factoring in additional renewable energy sources, Ethiopiahas enormous potential as well. The total annual solar radiationreaching the country is on the order of over 200 million tons of oilequivalent (TOE) per year, which is more than twelve times the annualenergy consumption in the region, while the total wind resource poten-tial amounts to 42 million TOE/year, which also exceeds gross energyconsumption by about 2.5 times (Mulugetta, 2008). Except for biomassenergy sources, exploitable reserves far exceed the exploited levels(Wolde-Ghiorgis, 2002). By tapping into even a fraction of these

+1 802 831 1158.ool@vt.edu (B.K. Sovacool).

ergy Initiative. Published by Elsevi

resources, Ethiopia would bemore than able to meet the growing ener-gy demand for much of East Africa. Given that only 22% of the popula-tion has access to the grid, it is obvious that energy resources availabledo not instantly equate to widespread usage. Nevertheless, the energysupplies represent a solid foundation for any energy industry.

Ethiopia's electrical generating capacity further illustrates the de-gree to which its energy resources remain untapped. In spite ofEthiopia's estimated 30,000 MW in hydropower, electrical generationcapacity was at only about 1000 MW as of 2009. This is only enoughto provide each person in Ethiopia with 23 kWh of electricity per year(Wolde-Ghiorgis, 2002)—less electricity than the average Americanuses to operate their refrigerator for one month. Ethiopia's level ofconsumption is well below that of India (about 100 kWh per year)and Egypt (about 230 kWh per year) (EEPCO, 2000; InternationalEnergy Association IEA, 2001; World Bank, 1984). Not only is theelectricity generating capacity relatively meager, but the country'space of electrification has also been extremely slow. The electrifica-tion levels attained as of 1998, the last time reliable estimates werecompiled, reached only 10% of the population.

In short, there exists an energy access problem in Ethiopia, whichthe Gaia Association—a homegrown nonprofit energy organizationfunded initially by Royal Dutch Shell—was able to address throughits largely successful ethanol-based cook stove program. The successof Project Gaia has led to the government promotion of a whole host ofrenewable technologies ranging from biogas digesters, solar home sys-tems, and biomass stoves. The ultimate goal is for a completely carbonneutral Ethiopian economy by 2025, and therefore the achievements of

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246 C. Rogers et al. / Energy for Sustainable Development 17 (2013) 245–251

Project Gaia are not just an improvement for families in urban and ruralcommunities, but a harbinger for the global green economic future of anation.

Research methods

To explore the dynamics of Project Gaia and the rural energy chal-lenges facing Ethiopia, we relied on an inductive, narrative case studyapproach based on data collected from semi-structured research in-terviews. This format enabled us to ask expert participants a set ofstandard inquiries but then allowed the conversation to build anddeviate to explore new directions and areas. We relied on qualitativemethods because many of the variables of interest to us—such as theongoing energy policy challenges confronting Ethiopia, or the factorsexplaining the features of Project Gaia—are difficult to measure, andcannot be described with quantitative data alone. We thereforecontacted 23 participants for interviews from a mix of governmentministries and agencies, international organizations, and energy andequipment suppliers from June to August 2012. These included:

• Government agencies such as the Ethiopian Ministry of Water andEnergy;

• International organizations such as the World Bank, United NationsDevelopment Program, United States Agency for International Devel-opment, and Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ);

• Energy providers such as Royal Dutch Shell, SNV World, EthiopiaWind, and the Gaia Association.

This sort of sampling is “purposive” rather than “random” as weintentionally targeted those with extensive knowledge about Ethiopianenergy policy and/or the Gaia Project. We conducted each interview inEnglish. For more on the validity of this method, readers are invited tosample Booth et al. (2008), George and Bennett (2004) and King et al.(1994); for its previous use in this journal, they can see Sovacool et al.(2011a,b), Bambawale et al., 2011, and Sovacool and Valentine (2011).

During our interviews, we asked participants to: (a) identify themost serious energy challenges facing Ethiopia, (b) state the expectedbenefits to the Project Gaia, (c) summarize some of the key barriers toits implementation, and (d) discuss general lessons that Project Gaiaoffers other energy development programs. At the request of someparticipants, we present such data in our article as anonymous, thoughinformation from the interviews was often recorded (when done ver-bally) and always carefully coded.

We supplemented these interviews with a review of reports andpeer reviewed articles relating to energy policy in Ethiopia. We presentthe information collected from our interviews in a narrative, case studyformat, one widely used in this journal by the author and colleagues togain insight into the dynamics of particular energy development pro-grams (see, again, Bambawale et al., 2011; Sovacool and Valentine,2011; Sovacool et al., 2011a,b for a small sample).

Country background

Ethiopia is one of two African countries, along with Liberia, thatEuropean conquerors have never managed to colonize. Yet like manyAfrican countries, Ethiopia must overcome challenges of economic op-portunity and access to energy. The country has an energy access prob-lem, the population continues to grow, and traditional sources of energysuch as fuelwood and charcoal are becoming scarce. Although thesechallenges present many problems for Ethiopia's energy policy, theysurprisingly provide it with an opportunity to develop an economydriven by sustainable technologies.

Ethiopia's economy is propelled by a rural, agrarian sector that reliesupon ancient farming techniques. In sizable regions of Ethiopia, theprime source of livelihood is pastoral farming and staple food items,cash crops, and grazing for domestic animals (Wolde-Ghiorgis, 2002).

Exports are based on this lifestyle and include animal hides, coffee,and oil seeds. This has had two key effects on Ethiopia. First, eco-nomic growth has occurred much slower than in almost everyother country in the world. Ethiopia is currently ranked 174th of179 in terms of gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, and169th of 177 in terms of the human development index (Bekeleand Taddese, 2012). Second, per capita energy consumption levelsin Ethiopia are very low, amounting to less than 50 kWh per yearfor urban customers (those most likely to subscribe to electricitynetworks) and less than 25 kWh per person for the country as awhole (Bekele and Taddese, 2012).

Additionally, modern fuel usage is about 0.02 tons of oil equiva-lent (TOE) per capita, which is one of the lowest in the world(Kebede et al., 2002). Much like the use of biomass for energy, thesame disparity between urban and rural household use exists formodern fuels. While 57.4% of urban households use electricity forlighting, only 0.7% of rural households do the same (Kebede et al.,2002). Put another way, 85% of the population lives in rural areas,yet electricity coverage outside of urban areas is merely 2%(Bekele and Taddese, 2012). Moreover, those who do have accessto energy suffer frequent power cuts, even in the capital city andurban center of Addis Ababa (Müggenburg et al., 2012).

Another major problem for Ethiopia's energy policy is population-driven growth in energy demand. The government's Plan for Accel-erated and Sustained Development to End Poverty has set aggres-sive targets for economic growth and as a result, the currentenergy demand is growing at a rate of more than 17% per year(Bekele and Taddese, 2012). Yet the population is growing at arate of about 3% annually, which will reach 120 million people by2025 and put more pressure on the energy growth rate to keeppace (Mulugetta, 2008). Thus, in order to meet the government'sambitious plans to maintain its current rate of economic growth, en-ergy demand will have to accelerate rapidly from its current levels.

The growth in energy demand has serious implications for Ethiopia'sfuture because the country's resources are already stretched considerably.Deforestation over the past 80 years has resulted in increased scarcity ofwood, and it has led to higher prices in urban areas (Gebreegziabher etal., 2012). Unfortunately, the dilemmas induced by energy scarcity donot end with deforestation. Ethiopia must import fossil fuels for its trans-portation sector, which it did at a cost of about $110 million in 2005(Mulugetta, 2008). One expert expressed concerns about the Ethiopiangovernment's ability to continue paying for petroleum when the cost ofsubsidization already accounts for 86% of the foreign spending budget ofthe government. Most likely, the government will transfer more of theprice of fossil fuels onto consumers once it can no longer pay for them,which will only exacerbate energy poverty issues. Furthermore, there isa trend towards incurring national debt to pay for energy imports,which will only get worse (Mulugetta, 2008).

Lastly, the economic and population growth combined with thegrowing energy scarcity problem have all put more stress on the cur-rent electricity infrastructure. High demand for energy along with theforecasted impacts of climate change on the hydropower systems hasresulted in perpetual energy shortages (Bekele and Taddese, 2012).Although Ethiopia is highly dependent upon hydropower, multiplerespondents stated their doubts about the ability of the governmentto commit to the high investment costs necessary to expand hydro-power capacity and to meet construction deadlines for current pro-jects. In order to alleviate the problem, frequent load shedding andpower outages (so-called “power shading” by the Ethiopians) haveafflicted millions of urban Ethiopians over the past five years.

History and description of Project Gaia

Despite thewide-ranging social impacts of energy scarcity in Ethiopia,its domesticmarket has perhaps felt the costmost acutely. This is becausethe overwhelming use of energy in Ethiopia is from households. As the

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price of fossil fuels has gone up, so have the associated costs of the heavyreliance on biomass. Within this domestic market, life is evenmore diffi-cult for the refugee population within Ethiopia, which currently consistsof two groups: about 336,000 international refugees, people mostlyfrom Somalia, Sudan, and Eritrea (UNHCR, 2012), and about 35 millioninternally displaced Ethiopian citizens, representing about 40% of thecountry's entire population (Mills, 2005).Many of these refugees—precisenumbers are unknown—live in temporary camps. Ethiopia shares borderswith six countries in a region where political, social, and environmentalchallenges (including droughts, famines, floods and armed insurgencies)have causedmassive displacement (Esayas andMurren, 2005). Althoughsome of the refugee camps were formed almost 20 years ago as tempo-rary solutions, they continue to grow at the rate of tens of thousands ofpeople per year (UNHCR, 2011). Since these camps suffer from the samelack of access to modern fuels and electricity confronting non-refugeeEthiopians, they rely on fuelwood for their energy needs. Furthermore,the wood supply surrounding these camps has decreased over theyears, creating an unhealthy tension between refugees and the localpopulation (Debebe, 2008).

Since the energy access problems in the refugee camps reflectthose in the broader population to a larger degree, Project Gaia decid-ed they would be a good place to begin converting byproducts fromthe sugar industry into ethanol to be utilized by domestic cookstoves,or more specifically, a device known as the “CleanCook” stove, or “CC”for short, shown in Fig. 1, designed by Ethiopian engineers exclusivelyfor Project Gaia and almost exclusively utilized in Ethiopia. ProjectGaia's primary stakeholders are the Gaia Association, an EthiopianNGO, and the non-profit Gaia Research Studies firm of US-based StokesConsulting Group, with an initial large amount of funding from theRoyal Dutch Shell's Foundation (Murren and Debebe, 2006). Other keypartners include the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, In-ternational Rescue Committee, the LutheranWorld Federation, and theAdministration for Refugees and Returnee Affairs (“ARRA”).

The initial pilot study for Project Gaia, which began in 2004, fo-cused on both refugee camps and the urban market of Addis Ababa.It had the goal of distributing 850 CC stoves to a mix of householdsin Addis Ababa and those spread across refugee camps (Murren andDebebe, 2006). In addition to the stoves, the project also made liquidethanol available through an agreementwith one of fourmanufacturersin Ethiopia's sugar industry (Murren and Debebe, 2006). The city ofAddis Ababa consists of 10 sub-cities with a population of about 4.5

Fig. 1. In Kirkos Sub City in Addis Ababa, Fetiya has replaced her charcoal stove withthe CleanCook (CC) Stove from Project Gaia.

million people throughout the greater metropolitan area, each thenbroken into smaller administrative districts called kebeles. Under thedirection of the kebele officials, 50 homes were selected from withinone kebele for each sub-city. From the 50 homes, an average of 12homes was selected from the high income group, 23 from the middleincome group, and 15 from the low income group. This breakdownwas determined by kebele administrators and the Project Gaia team,based on demographic andmarket surveys, and assessing the perceivedpurchasing power for the stove and fuel combination within each in-come group (Murren and Debebe, 2006).

Once in the homes, the stoves remained for 90 days. During thefirst month, ethanol was provided free of cost. At the start of monthtwo, households paid 1.65 Ethiopian Birr (“ETB”) (about $0.09) perliter of ethanol. Month three incurred a cost of 2.25 Birr (about $0.13)per liter of ethanol to the consumer. This staggered pricing mechanismwas used to understanduserwillingness to pay for the fuel, which couldalso be used to infer stove and fuel satisfaction. If households werewill-ing to purchase the fuel at a higher cost, it was probable that theyenjoyed and preferred using the CC stove and ethanol fuel in theirkitchens (Murren and Debebe, 2006).

In addition to the distribution of the CC stoves themselves, the GaiaFoundation also had to distribute their ethanol fuel. Fortunately, Ethiopiaalready had a large, government-owned sugarcane industry, whichproduces about 115,000 tons/year of molasses as a by-product. Somemolasses is fed to animals or exported, but the selling price is low andmarkets are limited. Much of the molasses is simply dumped in riversor on land, causing pollution. In 1999, a plant was built at the Finchaasugar mill to produce ethanol from molasses by fermentation. Thisplant currently produces about eight million liters of ethanol per year,of which about two million liters are used by local industries, the restavailable as both a cooking or transportation fuel (Debebe, 2008).

In Project Gaia, the Gaia Association buys ethanol from the gov-ernment under an annual contract (which has just been renewed in2012). The ethanol is denatured with a bitter additive to make it un-palatable for drinking, and it is also dyed blue so that it cannot be mis-taken for water. This is done at the Gaia Association office in AddisAbaba before the ethanol goes out to homes. Ethanol is currentlytransported in a 13,500 liter tanker from the sugar mill to locked stor-age tanks at the Kebribeyah refugee camp in Ethiopia's Somali region.The Gaia Association is currently buying threemore 30,000 liter tankersto be large enough to supply other camps. Each participating refugeefamily has to be registered with the UNHCR, and is then issued with astove and coupons for ethanol through the UNHCR rations system.Every ten days, the family exchanges a coupon for 10 l of ethanol(Debebe, 2008). The stoves can use what respondents called “technicalethanol” consisting of 96% ethanol, 4% water, cheaper and easier tomake than the 99.5% purity required in “power ethanol” for use in gas-oline engines as gasoline ethanol blends.

Following the successful dissemination of an initial 850 CC stovesin its pilot study, the Gaia Association scaled-up its operations. By theend of April 2008, it had supplied CC stoves to all 1780 families inKebribeyah refugee camp, and 50 to households in Addis Ababa. Italso had 3200 stoves on order: 800 for Teferi Ber camp; 2000 stovesfor a government housing development; and 500 for a Catholic socialhousing program, all within an annual budget of 12,878,000 Birr(about $718,000), or 530 Birr (about $30) per CC (Debebe, 2008). Asthe next section shows, the benefits from Project Gaia's stoves fall intosocial, environmental, and economical categories.

Benefits of Project Gaia

Social

In rural areas and Ethiopian refugee camps, women such as thosein Fig. 2 have the primary responsibility of collecting fuelwood usedin the home. Within refugee camps, women must leave their confines

Fig. 2. Women refugees collecting fuelwood near the Ethiopian–Somali Border.

248 C. Rogers et al. / Energy for Sustainable Development 17 (2013) 245–251

several times per week to gather firewood for cooking. Such trips canlast up to 8 h. Not only are they exhausting, but also they put womenin great danger, with many reports of harassment, rape and other vi-olence. As one of our interviewees put it:

Collecting fuelwood in Ethiopia can be dangerous. Women must al-ways face the dangers that accompany it, including beatings, sexualharassment, wild animals, falls, and exhaustion.

Back injuries, scrapes, and broken limbs are common consequencesfrom the arduous work because these wood collection trips must occurevery two or three days. The CC stoves therefore give thesewomen free-dom from the burden of gathering fuelwood (Debebe, 2008).

Moreover, the CC stoves have the added benefit of empowerment.Since the collection and harvesting of wood for cooking falls specificallyon women, it prevents women from using their time on other activities.With more free time, women in Ethiopia benefitting from CC stoves canengage in more productive activities such as childcare, education, and insome cases income generation (Lambe and Debebe, 2006). Of all thebenefits of the CC stoves, respondents repeatedly mentioned thegender-specific benefits that result from eliminating biomass collectionfrom daily life. Or, as one respondent explained, “under project Gaia,women, who no longer need to gather wood fuel, can get extra money,grow more food, receive a better education, and spend time with theirchildren in homes unpolluted by harmful soot.”

Fig. 3. Forest cover (in Black) around Awassa, Et

Environmental

By using the CC stoves, Ethiopians are able to decrease their reli-ance on the shrinking availability of forest reserves. Over the pastfour decades, satellite images such as the one in Fig. 3 show that forestcoverage in Ethiopia has dropped dramatically from 54,410 km2 in1973 to about 18,975 km2 in 2006 (Mengistu and De Stopp, 2006).Fig. 3 shows forest cover near Awassa in the southern part of the coun-try, where almost 40% of the greater population currently resides in ref-ugee camps or makeshift, nonpermanent rural villages. Deforestation,and all of its ancillary consequences that stem from the economy to bio-diversity, have wreaked havoc on Ethiopia. Although their statementcould not be independently verified, according to one respondent:

The household energy sector receives 97% of its energy from biomass.This creates a lot of pressure on the forests of Ethiopia, which are verysmall (only 3–7% of the land). Prior coverage by forests was muchlarger, and if the forests disappear under the strain of fuelwood col-lection, villages could collapse.

In the case of the Kebribeyah camp, the UNHCR in Ethiopia hassatellite images from 1988 which show a well-forested area aroundKebribeyah, which is now almost barren (Müggenburg et al., 2012).

With the CC stoves, the potential reduction in fuel wood usage issubstantial. In the pilot project, the provision of 1 l of ethanol per dayto the refugee families in the Kebribeyah camp replaced between 95and 100% of their firewood use (Debebe, 2008). Extrapolated over thecourse of a year, the gains become evenmore apparent.With an averagehousehold consumption of about 3.7 tons/year, this would suggest totalfuel wood savings of about 6600 tons/year (Debebe, 2008) for thoseparticipating in Project Gaia so far. Moreover, the replacement of3.7 tons/year of unsustainable wood by an ethanol stove saves a totalof about 6.2 tons/year CO2 equivalent (Debebe, 2008). This figure in-cludes the greenhouse gas emissions from ethanol processing, and italso includes both CO2 and non-CO2 greenhouse gases, although itdoes not include indirect emissions at the sugarcane plantation fromland use changes (which in theory could offset emissions reduction).Ethanol for Project Gaia was made from waste molasses, so that thereare no emissions from land use changes. However, an expanded ethanolprogram to fuel vehicles and/or cookstoves is likely to require addition-al land dedicated to sugarcane. The indirect emissions from these sugar-cane plantations would depend on the previous use of the land and thecarbon stored in its plants and soils (Fargione et al., 2008; Pacca and

hiopia, about 270 km south of Addis Ababa.

Fig. 4. A K-50 stove susceptible to causing explosions and severe burns.

249C. Rogers et al. / Energy for Sustainable Development 17 (2013) 245–251

Moreira, 2009). Note, however, that recent Ethiopian greenhouse gasinventories suggest that land use change and forestry account for only1% of national emissions, with the bulk of emissions coming from live-stock farming, electricity supply, and methane from landfills andwaste (Asress, 1995; Keller, 2009). Thus, in all likelihood the CC stovesbeing promoted by Project Gaia have the potential to meaningfully re-duce deforestation and lower Ethiopia's carbon footprint, but the emis-sions implications of expanded sugarcane production would need to bemonitored.

Additionally, CC stoves have health benefits. According to one survey,86 out of 99 households using traditional, non-ethanol stoves reportedone or more health problems, and 74 of these 86 cooks believed thatsmoke from their traditional stove was a cause of their health problems(G'Egziabher et al., 2006). Out of these cooks, 74% reported a persistentcoughing, which is symptomatic of respiratory problems caused by in-door air pollution. Sixty-four percent of these 86 primary cooks sufferfrom headaches; 50% of them experienced eye irritation; 31% of themsuffered from shortness of breath; 21% had constant phlegm (whichcan reduce airflow); 12% suffered from backaches (possibly from fuelwood gathering); and 1% of the cooks suffered a heart attack. In addition,mothers often carry young children on their back while cooking, so in-fants and children may spend several hours breathing cooking smokeon a daily basis.

In another study, careful monitoring of the indoor air quality inrefugees' homesusing specialized equipmentwas carried out in a sampleof homes both before and after the introduction of the ethanol CC stoves.This monitoring showed that cooking with traditional, non-ethanolstoves resulted in CO levels significant enough to contribute to mildheadaches, fatigue, nausea, and dizziness for a 4–6 hour period (Esayasand Murren, 2005). Results also showed that the CC stove reduced thelevels of CO and PM towithin the recommendedWorldHealthOrganiza-tion standards. Since ethanol burns cleanly with no smoke, the introduc-tion of the CC stove has thus improved the health of thosewho spend themost time in the kitchen—namely, women and children.

Lastly, one of the original motivating factors for the creation of anethanol market in Ethiopia was the contamination of rivers andstreams by the sugar industry. Traditionally, there was no use forthe molasses by-product of sugar production, and there was noeasy means of disposal. However, producing ethanol for use in theCC stoves minimizes pollution by creating value where none existedbefore.

Economic

In Ethiopia, homes depend on combination of different fuels tomeettheir cooking needs. A study in the capital city of Addis Ababa identified14 different fuel sources, ranging from dung and wood in lower incomehomes to liquefied petroleum gas and electricity in higher incomehomes. The results of the study demonstrated that kerosene is themost widely used fuel in Addis Ababa, followed by charcoal and fuel-wood. Kerosene is also most expensive, with households spending53.89 Birr/month, followed by fuelwood at 42.27 Birr/month (Murrenand Debebe, 2006). Dung, agri-residue, sawdust, eucalyptus leaves,bark-leaves-twigs, LPG, and electricity play lesser roles in meetingcooking demands (Murren and Debebe, 2006).

Several of the fuel sources have specialized uses, which meansthat while charcoal is used in more homes, the impact that a pricechange would have on households is fundamentally different than forfuelwood. For example, charcoal's ubiquity is directly related to the beliefthat it can only provide the necessary quick cooking for the coffee cere-mony, which is a daily, time-honored tradition in homes throughoutEthiopia. On the other hand, fuelwood is primarily used for baking injera,a flat-bread that is eaten with every meal throughout Ethiopia.

The benefit derived from the CC stoves stems from their cost com-petitiveness with kerosene (when it is available) and their efficiencyover traditional stoves (when kerosene is not available, more often

the case). As stated by one of the respondents, the price savings ofthe CC stove has driven its success:

Affordability has been the biggest benefit. Because the economy isgrowing quickly and the population is increasing, the demand for en-ergy is also increasing. People are adopting the cook stoves, becausethey have a 50–60% saving compared to traditional open fire stove.

One additional and often overlooked cost that the CC stoves alleviateis that of biomass energy collection. Time spent collecting wood fuelprohibits time spent on household activities, farming activities, as wellas educational activities. Naturally, because the task of collection fallsonwomen, thismeans that the opportunity cost alsowidens the gendergap. The marginal productivity of labor shows that on average house-holds lose 75 Ethiopian Birr cents (about $0.04) for each hour spentcollecting energy sources when the task is performed by females be-tween the ages of 18 and 59. This translates to a daily marginal produc-tivity rate of about 6 Birr (about $0.33), which is slightly lower than thewomen agricultural casual labor rate of 7 Birr (about $0.39) per day anda government minimum daily wage rate of about 8 Birr (about $0.45)(Gwavuya et al., 2012). In other words, the cost to households for bio-mass collection is roughly equal to the value of one day's farming labor.

Challenges facing Project Gaia

Though it has been a success, Project Gaia continues to encountera series of educational, political, and logistical challenges.

Educational

One of the most serious barriers mentioned by respondents is an“improperly placed fear” about the dangers of using ethanol-basedstoves. In the past, some “cleaner” cookstoves marketed in Ethiopiasuffered dangerous explosions and caused severe burns when usedincorrectly. The most notorious example is the K-50 stove shown inFig. 4, which uses 50% ethanol and 50% kerosene. These stoves were

250 C. Rogers et al. / Energy for Sustainable Development 17 (2013) 245–251

not designed for a 100% kerosene fuel blend, but many consumers didnot understand this limitation. As a result, several people were in-jured by improper use of the stoves (Murren and Debebe, 2006).

Although the K50 stove fell out of use rather quickly, it generated astigma against liquid fuel stoves that has remained. When asked aboutthe relative popularity of CC stoves, multiple respondents were quick tomention the confusion about the stoves. One stated that “people areafraid of ethanol stoves even though Project Gaia's model is muchmore improved than the earlier locally produced K-50model which ex-ploded a few times causing some severe burns.”

Political

Although the law on renewable energy explicitly states a goal ofpromoting ethanol stoves, there is a dearth of political support forthe domestic ethanol market. Instead, the focus by the Ethiopian gov-ernment has been to develop the ethanol fuel-blending market first,mostly for a combination of urban users in the transportation sectorand lucrative exports. One of our interviewees stated that:

Throughout its implementation period, Project Gaia has been chal-lenged mainly by interruptions in ethanol supply from governmentowned sugar factories, causing refugee women to return back to fuel-wood gathering … These interruptions have almost solely been causedby the gasoline-ethanol blending program started by the government.Almost 90% of the ethanol is now used by the government for blendingethanol with gasoline with the aim of saving foreign currency from thetransport sector through this program.

Also, when there are problems with the factory and the supply ofethanol is not as high as anticipated, one of the respondents statedthat the transportation sector has priority over the household market.Since 85% of the population lives in rural areas without automobiles,the favoritism of fuel blending works against the majority of the pop-ulation. Overall, Ethiopia's energy policy is somewhat “biased to-wards the urban market and neglects the rural.”

As a reflection of this bias, consider that investment in the energy sec-tor in the last decade amounted to 5.5 billion Birr (about $306 million),yet only 1% was spent on “traditional” energy sources such as fuelwoodplantations, training programs, and community woodlots. Furthermore,investment in the rural energy sector in the last 5 years has been 0.1%of total sector investment or only Birr 0.5 million per year. It shouldbe noted that most of this amount was allocated to traditional fuelconservation interventions in mainly urban and semi-urban areas(Wolde-Ghiorgis, 2002). Simply put, Ethiopian energy policy doesnot address rural areas. One respondent lamented that the while fuelblending of ethanol requires substantial technical expertise and invest-ment, the CC stove market requires much less support and can benefitmore people. However, rural energy is “barely mentioned in the policydocument, andwhen it is brought up, it is in reference to rural transporttechnologies.”

A second indication of this bias is that Ethiopia lacks an authorityor organ responsible for introducing rural energy initiatives otherthan grid electricity and petroleum products. As one of the respon-dents put it:

CC stoves lack of a strong champion within the government. Withoutinstitutional and managerial structures and controls, it is impossibleto realize the proposals that have been repeatedly stated as solutionsto the rural energy problem during the last 20 years.

As a result of these biases towards the fuel blending market andurban areas, there have been significant issues with the supply of eth-anol. Indeed, when the first batch of refugee camp residents receivedtheir stoves, one of the problems that they repeatedly highlightedwas the need for sufficient supply and consistency in the distribution

of ethanol. One of the determining factors of willingness to use the CCstoves was the availability of the ethanol in the market. Residentshave also mentioned that they had been using ethanol for threemonths comfortably when supply was interrupted, which prompteda return to previous habits of firewood collection (Hassen, 2006). Asone of the respondents explained:

One of the constraints they have that I was told was lack of fuel fortheir ethanol based cookstoves. The Ethiopian government is current-ly using the bulk of the ethanol produced in the country for petroleumblending.

Part of the supply challenge relates to government ownership ofthe sugar industry. Some delays in the procurement and transporta-tion of ethanol to the camp were experienced as Gaia staff was forcedto wait for Finchaa Sugar Company to finalize its pricing mechanism forthe ethanol contracted to the Gaia Association (Lambe and Debebe,2006). These delays in turn affected distribution of the ethanol and some-times resulting in scheduling conflicts (Murren and Debebe, 2006). Therelationship between the supply issue and government control wasexplained by one of the respondents as such:

The problem was ethanol availability. It was difficult for them to get areliable supply. The price of ethanol is fixed by the government andfactories are governed by a board, which seeks to increase profits.The government tells them to sell at a lower price, but the factory op-erators realize that they have a valuable commodity and can sell theethanol at a higher price.

In order to address this issue, multiple additional distilleries areunder construction, which should produce enough ethanol to meet thepresent and projected levels of ethanol consumption by a domestic mar-ket. However, based on the current trend, the increased supply of etha-nol will not eliminate the priority given to the transportation sector.Instead, one respondent admitted that the goal is to increase the fuelblend from 10% ethanol to 25% by 2015—a shift that would require agrowth in production from 9 million liters in 2010 to 190 million litersby 2015. To reach this ambitious goal, plannerswill likely continue to pri-oritize ethanol for transport rather than for cooking.

Lastly, there are political challenges relating to the government'scontrol of the sugar industry, which directly controls ethanol produc-tion. As stated by one the respondents, since the government controlsthe supply of ethanol, the private sector does not have a secure supplyand it would be very costly for the private sector to develop one. Theconcerns about government ownership reflect the belief in the pri-vate sector that the government does not want to encourage growthunless it can control it.

Logistical

A final challenge is the logistical difficulty of creating an entirelynew domestic market for ethanol. As explained by one of therespondents:

Project implementation is important, because you have to educatethe people about the technology that you are trying to spread, youhave to explain how they will benefit long-term, and you have to givepeople financial help so people can acquire new technologies.

In other words, solutions designed for introducing initiatives to ad-dress the rural energy problems in Ethiopia will need to be backed byclear, strong and strict legal frameworks (Wolde-Ghiorgis, 2002). More-over, the successful implementation of rural energy initiatives requirehuman resources and technical capability to be built from the outset ofthe project. Rural energy policies should clearly define the role of scien-tists, hardware and software engineers, as well as supporting technicians,

251C. Rogers et al. / Energy for Sustainable Development 17 (2013) 245–251

energy economists, accountants and managers in rural energy develop-ment (Wolde-Ghiorgis, 2002). As argued by one of the respondents, de-signing a new system “is very challenging, because of the constantrevisions to strategy and approach.”Another suggested that the Ethiopiangovernment's stated “enthusiasm” for Project Gaia is in reality “hostile toprivate sector development and the expansion of the program.”

Conclusions and recommendations

Despite the challenges of educating the market, a governmentalfavoritism of the urban population at the expense of rural energyusers, and the difficultly of pioneering domestic use of ethanol, ProjectGaia has succeeded in improving the standards of living for some ofEthiopia's scattered refugee population, and mitigated some of the fac-tors driving deforestation. Within the particular contexts of that suc-cess, a few lessons emerge.

First, Project Gaia demonstrates the importance of governmentconsistency. Though it could indeed be doing better, one thing uniqueto Ethiopia is the strong desire of the government to control the devel-opment and diffusion of ethanol technology. From one respondent'sperspective, the success of Project Gaia can be attributed to “the exten-sive collaboration between the different levels of government from thelowest level all the way up to the top.”

A second key takeaway is the value of selecting appropriate technolo-gymatched in proper scale and service to the needs of households. In thecase of Ethiopian refugees, energy needs are particularly acute, and smallgains canmake a huge difference. Just by reducing the amount of biomasscollection, Project Gaia has resulted in substantial health and environ-mental benefits along with an increased potential for empowerment ofwomen. It was consequently driven by the needs of these end-users rath-er than those of private companies or international donors. It also showsthat “ordinary” households are not the only market for cleaner burningcookstoves; refugees and those displaced by environmental degradationand civil strife also have their own, often more urgent energy needs.

Third, it is worthwhile to recognize Project Gaia's ability to couplecommercial enterprises to the selling and use of CC stoves. Ethiopia istrying to create a domestic ethanol market but amounts of molasseslarge enough to meet the cooking needs of thousands of householdsare currently wasted. Project Gaia converts this wasted resource intoan energy fuel. Put another way, the Gaia Foundation did not rely ongoodwill and benevolence alone to persuade the government to initiatetheir project. Sugar distilleries and ethanol manufacturers benefit froma new niche market. Refugee families and those living in urban areasbenefit by receiving a cheaper fuel and significant time savings. Thoughstill small in its overall national impact, policymakers benefit from lessstress on Ethiopia's dwindling forests near refugee camps and displacedgreenhouse gas emissions. “One of the sweetest things about the nectarof Project Gaia,” noted one respondent, “is that everybody wins.”

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