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Unite Behind the Science: When it Comes to Cooking, it’s Time for ‘Clean’ to Mean Something
Nearly 3 billion people still live in homes where someone burns sticks, charcoal or dung to cook, devastating their health, their local environments and the climate. Yet thousands of projects have failed to deliver truly clean cooking to the masses, doing a disservice to customers and damaging the sector's credibility with funders. Eric Reynolds, CEO of the cookstove company Inyenyeri, argues that there's only one way to turn this around: "deliver dramatically improved outcomes, and be able to prove it." He outlines a straightforward way the industry can make that happen.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment, Health Care, Social Enterprise
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From Early Adopters to Tech Laggards: Understanding Off-Grid Energy Customers
The team at 60 Decibels recently set out to understand the motivations of customers served by off-grid energy firms in Africa. Researchers quizzed customers in Kenya, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia about their attitudes and behaviours toward new products to find out who were the early innovators, early adopters or tech laggards. Kat Harrison and Hassan Nasser of 60 Decibels explain the research and how firms can convert ambivalent customers into product ambassadors.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment, Impact Assessment, Technology
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What Rural Solar Energy Enterprises Can Learn from Mobisol’s Hard-Earned Lesson
Energy access pioneer Mobisol’s insolvency, announced last spring, sparked questions about the industry’s health. But according to Rob Goodier, managing editor at Engineering for Change, subsequent analyses suggest that many of the company's problems were internal, not a reflection of the industry as a whole. He explores what the rural energy sector can learn from Mobisol’s struggles, based on interviews with industry insiders and two people close to the company.
- Categories
- Energy, Social Enterprise
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Jeff Bezos Unveils Sweeping Plan to Tackle Climate Change
Bezos expects 80% of Amazon’s energy use to come from renewable sources by 2024, before transitioning to zero emissions by 2030.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment
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Report: Solar Boosting Economic Prospects for Rural East Africans
New report from GOGLA, the global association for the off-grid solar energy industry, shows an overwhelming majority (94%) of people living with off-grid solar home systems reporting improvements to their quality of life
- Categories
- Energy
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Global Renewable Energy Initiative Aims to Bring a Billion People in From the Dark
Worldwide commission aims to end energy poverty in sub-Saharan Africa and south Asia by driving investment in new technology.
- Categories
- Energy
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Viewpoint: The Energy Transformation Is Not Happening Fast Enough
Climate finance as promised at the 2015 Paris meeting could have helped to avoid the recent construction of many new coal-fired power plants in Asia and Africa, which will be adding to the legacy of our industrial era for decades to come. But alas, as economic nationalism and ethnic chauvinism have taken roots, the willingness for international cooperation has dwindled, and with it the willingness to cooperate.
- Categories
- Energy
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The Land of Opportunity for Off-Grid Solar
Consolidation is picking up in Africa’s off-grid renewables market, where big investors like Engie are betting on the electricity consumers of the future.
- Categories
- Energy
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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