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Fuel efficient stoves in Honduras

The GoClimate community is supporting a Gold Standard project financing fuel efficient stoves in Honduras. The installation of these improved stoves does a lot of good. Indoor toxic smoke is being avoided , CO2 emissions are being reduced, trees are saved and new job opportunities created. The non-profit organization selling the carbon offsets to finance the stoves is called Proyecto Mirador.

Open Fire Cooking Causes Problems

Honduras boasts the fourth largest rainforest in the world, but deforestation is occurring at an alarming rate. One of the causes for deforestation is that wood is used as fuel. To lessen deforestation is crucial. Forests help keep our climate stable and regulate our water supply, in addition to providing home to many animal species. Along with the climate crisis, the loss of biodiversity is one of the current and most severe threats to the planet today.

The collection and burning of firewood for cooking is a time intensive task in Honduras, usually a burden for women. It destroys precious village-side forests and causes smoke-related health issues. According to the WHO, close to 4 million people globally die each year prematurely from illness attributable to household air pollution from inefficient cooking practices using polluting stoves paired with solid fuels and kerosene.

The project

The fuel efficient stoves combine clean combustion technology with local Honduran cooking practices. They are sold at an affordable price. The combustion process is more clean and efficient, compared to the traditional open fire system. Less fuel is needed and smaller branches can be used. This helps save the forests.

The toxic carbon monoxide is reduced by 79 percent, while the methane emissions are reduced by 94 percent. Reducing methane has a substantial positive impact on the climate. It’s a powerful greenhouse gas and the second largest contributor to global warming.  The gas has a global warming potential over 80 times that of carbon dioxide over a 20-year horizon. Methane has a shorter lifetime in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide – only twelve years, compared to up to hundreds for CO2 – so cuts in methane will limit temperature increase faster than cuts to carbon dioxide.

The project has the potential to mitigate 225 000 tonnes of CO2 yearly. To understand how much this is, the EU average CO2 emissions per person and year is 6.8 tonnes. 225 000 tonnes correspond to the emissions of more than 30 000 people living in Europe. 

Economic Benefits

Apart from the positive impact on the environment and Honduran people’s health, the Mirador project provides economic benefits. Women now have more free time for other activities, and can spend money previously reserved for fuel on other essentials. A microenterprise program also runs alongside this project, training entrepreneurs and providing specialized parts to build and install the stoves. 17 thriving microenterprises have expanded to provide 170 local jobs in areas where reliable employment is difficult to find.

The following SDGs are supported

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Clean Water Project in Cambodia

The GoClimate community has contributed to a ceramic water purifier project in Cambodia. The project helps improve public health, avoid CO2 emissions and reduce deforestation. Previously, no ceramic water purifier programs have been commercially viable in Cambodia. With the assistance of carbon finance, this project is economically sustainable.

In total, the project has the potential to provide clean drinking water to an estimated 312,000 households over 7 years. GoClimate’s offsetting 6,700 tonnes CO2 is a part of this. Thank you to all our members who have contributed!

The Importance of Clean Water and the Problems with Getting Access to It

In Cambodia, the majority of the population boils water (to make it safe for drinking) on wood fire stoves. Many people do not use any sort of purifying process at all. Drinking unpurified water can lead to illnesses, where young children are particularly vulnerable. In fact, according to the World Economic Forum, lack of access to safe drinking water is one of the biggest threats to humanity today. 

In the cases where the water is boiled, the smoke from the fire can have very harmful effects on respiratory health. Women and children are particularly exposed, spending a lot of time doing household work.  

Boiling is an energy intensive and time-consuming purification method, often involving burning wood. Burning wood leads to emissions of CO2, as well as to deforestation. To lessen deforestation is crucial as forests help keep our climate stable and regulate our water supply, in addition to providing home to many animal species. Along with the climate crisis, the loss of biodiversity is one of the most severe threats to the planet today.

The Solution

The project sells ceramic water purifiers to families across Cambodia. Once the water has passed through the ceramic filter the clean water is stored in a plastic container, giving safe drinking water at just a turn of the tap. No wood is needed, easing the pressure on Cambodia’s vulnerable forests. In addition, the CO2 emissions that would have come from boiling are omitted. 

Other Benefits

Cleaning water through ceramic water purifiers is good for the forests and the climate. 

Furthermore, as indoor smoke is reduced, respiratory health improves, while clean drinking water is an essential component to combatting diarrheal illness. The overall public health is improved, and this helps stimulate economic activity. Rural households save the cost for buying wood, as well as save the labour spent on preparing the water. Their resources are freed up for other activities.

The filters are produced at a purpose-built factory in Cambodia providing employment opportunities to locals. The filters have a number of low-interest financing options and many are sold to non-governmental organisations (NGOs) who offer them at a subsidised price.

The project contributes to the following SDGs:

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Low-carbon Public Transport in Delhi

In busy Delhi, with more than 18 million inhabitants, air pollution is a big problem. In addition to causing severe health problems – air pollution caused 1.9 million deaths worldwide in 2019- the emissions from traffic harm us and our one and only planet.

To address this, GoClimate has contributed to the Gold Standard project Regenerative braking technology for DMRC. This project aims at transforming the public transport system operated by Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC). By increasing the system’s energy efficiency, the project has the potential to mitigate CO2 emissions by on average 47 000 tonnes per year. This reduction corresponds to cutting the yearly emissions from nearly 10 000 people living in India.

Technological Innovation

The project increases energy efficiency in the DMRC transport system by replacing old car brakes with new regenerative braking technology. The regenerative braking technology conserves electrical energy, reducing energy consumption from the electricity grid, leading to cuts in GHG emissions. As of 1st June 2021, DMRC has constructed a massive transport network of around 389 km with 285 stations, meaning that many people are able to commute in an energy efficient way.

What else has the project contributed to?

The project has created both new jobs and training opportunities. The project owner also engages in a number of community initiatives, for example creating the popular Delhi Metro Museum.

This project contributes to the SDGs 4, 7, 8, 9 and 13.

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Clean Electricity from the Indian Sun

India is the world’s fourth largest emitter of carbon dioxide. With its rapid population growth, energy demands continue to increase. This is why GoClimate has chosen to support a large-scale solar plant – the Gold Standard certified Greenko Renewable Energy Project, in Madhya Pradesh in central India.

India is heavily dependent on fossil fuels where coal is the largest source of energy. It stands for 70% of the country’s energy. For the climate, a shift towards more renewable energy is crucial.

The solar plant in numbers

With its annual average production of 328,000 MWh, the Greenko project has the capacity to supply nearly 400,000 people in India with clean energy every year. The solar plant could in other words generate enough electricity to cater for a middle sized city.

Each year, 308,000 tonnes CO2e on average are mitigated. In 2020 (a year incused by the pandemic) the CO2 emissions per capita in the world were 4.62 tonnes. This means that the climate benefits from the solar plant are equal to avoiding the emissions caused by nearly 70,000 people.

How the location of the solar plant is chosen

This large scale solar plant generates green electricity that goes directly to the Indian grid. The Gold Standard certificate is a hallmark and an insurance that the location for the solar panels is carefully chosen. They are often installed in desert-like environments where there is a lot of radiation from the sun and little vegetation, where the panels do not negatively affect the local ecosystem. No forests shall be cut down to make space for a solar plant, neither shall arable land be used.

New jobs in the local community

When a project of this scale is to be built in a small village, it is fundamental that they develop a good relationship with the local community. All Gold Standard certified projects have a grievance mechanism which enables community members to register and voice concerns.

On top of the project’s climate benefits, this project contributes towards the local economy through the creation of 12 jobs and has conducted 6 trainings to educate staff.

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Efficient Cookstoves in Central China

– less wood and better health

GoClimate is happy to have contributed to reducing over 1,000 tonnes of CO2e emissions together with its members. This has been done through supporting the Gold Standard WWF Meigu High Efficient Cook Stove Project. The project is located in the Shaanxi Province in the Central China mountains. It contributes to decreasing deforestation and protecting a giant panda habitat. In addition, the local community benefits from improvement in health and time savings. 

How is it done?

The project is based on a process of reconstructing inefficient built-in stoves for cooking and heating into being 70% more efficient. As the thermal efficiency is improved, the new cookstoves use substantially less woodfuel. Another benefit is the chimney that filters out toxic smoke.

The project operates in the Ningshan County towns of Huangguan, Xingchang and Simudi. Theses towns are near Huangguanshan Nature Reserve in Ningshan County in the Shaanxi Province. Due to the inconvenient traffic and the weak power supply system and high electricity price, there is no other power solution to replace the wood consumption. Making the use more efficient is of utmost importance.

For the planet

Not only is the climate helped by the 1,000 tonnes CO2e mitigated as less wood needs to be collected and burnt, but the deforestation pressures on the local giant panda habitat are eased. For decades, the deep mountain communities of Shaanxi’s Ningshan County in Central China have collected their woodfuel from the nearby Huangguanshan Nature Reserve. To lessen deforestation is important. Forests help keep our climate stable and regulate our water supply, in addition to providing home to many species. The crucial giant panda habitat is currently threatened and  violated, harming the rare pandas and other wildlife. Despite reports on the giant panda population slowly increasing, it remains one of the rarest, most vulnerable bears in the world. Habitat preservation is therefor key. Along with the climate crisis, the loss of biodiversity is one of the current and most severe threats to the planet. 

Gains for the local community

Every year, indoor air pollution causes many deaths. Women and children being the ones most involved or exposed to this environment are worst affected. The project has the potential to make everyday life a little bit safer for the local community through decreased indoor toxic smoke.

Furthermore, time is freed up for local residents to focus on more productive tasks, like working for income. The chopping and collecting of woodfuel is done faster, when less is needed. 

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Belen Wind Power Plant

We have now offset another 50,000 ton CO2eq in a Gold Standard certified project! Thank you for taking part in this!

Renewable energy has to make up a larger share of the market globally, which is why we are now financing the Belen Wind Project in Turkey. The major purpose of the project activity is providing electricity from renewable sources to the rapidly growing Turkish electricity market.

The project is expected to generate about 135,000 MWh of electricity per year and prevent approximately 74,444 tonnes of CO2 emissions annually compared to the baseline scenario. Even though wind is increasing in Turkey, there is a heavy reliance on fossil fuels such as oil and coal, and the share of natural gas has grown to reach the same proportion as the other sources. We want to finance this kind of projects to show that there is support for sustainable energy, and spread awareness of the feasibility of better alternatives.

This project consists of an installation of 16 wind turbines, each having a capacity of 3000 kW, in Belen, on the Southeast Mediterranean coast of Turkey. The wind farm provides a total capacity of 48MW and is connected to the national grid. The project employs state of the art technology and installed high capacity 3MW turbines instead of 1.5MW turbines that used to be installed in the earlier days of wind energy developments in Turkey. These new turbines enable better use of the wind potential with a reduced project footprint area, minimising the impact on the natural environment.

It is worth mentioning that if not prepared and designed properly, wind energy can have negative environmental impacts. This is why it is important to do a so-called Environmental Impact Assessment. As we purchase credits from projects certified by Gold Standard, there has been a rigorous control of the risks as all projects have to comply with the “Safeguarding Principles and Requirements” . This covers human rights, gender issues, corruption, water and land use, and other potential impacts. Another important part of the project preparation is the stakeholder consultation, which is also documented in Project Design Document. 

For this project in particular, it is described in the Project Design Document that ”…some trees will be cut in order to enlarge the road to the site and to clear the surroundings of the turbines. However; it was assured that new plantation will be done in return by local Forestry Management”. Other issues addressed in the preparation phase was the concern for bird migration in the area, and potential impact from waste and water usage during the construction phase. Having this information available is mandatory, and is how we know we can trust the project. It allows for accountability, so that we can hold the project developer responsible for the impacts and mitigation measures. 

More information about this project in the Gold Standard registry (including verification and monitoring reports) HERE

See our retired credits HERE, HERE and HERE