Fuel From Waste: Locally Produced Ethanol for Household Use – Ethiopia

This project seeks to establish a sustainable source of clean, liquid ethanol fuel for cooking for poor urban households in Ethiopia. The small-scale, community-based ethanol project will be run by a cooperative of women who previously gathered fuel wood. The initiative is also addressing urgent energy needs with modern cooking appliance that allows all households to carry out their cooking in a clean, safe, and efficient way.

Fast facts:

1,000-litre daily capacity ethanol distillery being installed outside of Addis Ababa;
1,000 stoves to be provided to low- and middle-income households in Addis Ababa;
6- to 10-year lifespan of cook stove;
Around 7,500 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent to be replaced.

The problem

Billions of people around the world burn solid biomass fuels like wood, charcoal, agricultural waste, and animal dung on a daily basis to boil water and cook food. This is generating carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, and methane – which are the principal greenhouse gases contributing to climate change. In Ethiopia, households spend a significant portion of their income on energy, and large amounts of time collecting firewood. Ethanol has great potential to meet the immense household energy demand in the developing world. However, a lack of alcohol fuel for the household sector presents a significant challenge for fulfilling this potential.

The solution

This activity combines distribution of a robust alcohol-fueled cook stove with development of a local ethanol refinery. Fuel will be sourced from local, sustainable stocks including waste molasses and surplus sugarcane. The ethanol micro-distillery is in the process of being installed, after having conducted a country-wide, in-depth feedstock feasibility analysis. The primary feedstock from the distillery will be molasses, a byproduct from the state-owned sugar industry. Two additional feedstocks under review are cheese whey, and brewery waste from a state-owned distillery. While ethanol stoves require higher capital than lower-quality stoves, the gains in quality, efficiency, and in the competitive cost of ethanol fuel can overcome higher upfront cost.

Helping the planet

Clean cooking reduces emissions by displacing some of the most harmful manmade emissions, including carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, particulate matter, and soot. Cleaner-burning alcohol-based fuels reduce deforestation by decreasing the use of solid biomass for indoor cooking, therefore mitigating problems such as erosion and desertification.

Helping people

People, especially women, will save time on fuel wood collection and experience higher levels of personal safety by avoiding this time in the bush when they are vulnerable to attack. Women and children also have less exposure to indoor air pollution. Implementation of the micro-distillery plus stoves as a business concept could also provide economic benefits to the community. Micro-distillery projects create value from fruit and vegetable waste, mitigating annual harvest losses and promoting energy security. Use of the efficient cook stoves creates a cleaner, safer environment for all.

Scaling up

This first-of-its-kind project has garnered significant interest within Ethiopia and internationally. The ethanol stove and micro-distillery model is replicable in other countries or other parts of Ethiopia where communities lack access to clean, safe energy, as ethanol can be produced both on a large scale and a micro-scale from a variety of feedstocks. International partnerships allow for dissemination of ideas, results, and best practices at a high level. Market-based approaches to address energy poverty through this project will also be pursued. At a later stage, funding streams may also be diversified through carbon revenue and private investors.