Alcohol-based Cooking Stoves
Ethanol adn methanol are high-potential fuels that is produced based on plant material. In Malawi, Ethanol is available in
abundance since it is easy to extract as a by-product in sugar production from sugarcane molasses and there are two big
sugar porduction sites in the country. Moreover, ethanol can be generated by destillation of certain plants, some of which
are wide-spread and growing wild in Malawi as well.
A stove in which ethanol fuels should be used for cooking has to fulfill certain criteria, which in the past has crated some
challenges. It has to ensure that the ethanol is burnt stable, i.e. in a way that it will not explode, and the flame has to
reach certain heat levels (blue flame) to ensure that the energy is used efficiently.
There are cookers burning liquid ethanol directly, which is quite risky, as well as stoves using indirect combustion,
transferring the liquid ethanol into a gas stadium, and hybrids between the two. Gelfuel, a jelly produced from Ethanol, is
a more user-friendly way of burning Ethanol, but hasn’t yet gained wide acceptance in Malawi, probably due to its high
price of both fuel and stoves and the bad quality of gelfuel stoves available in the market.
In recent years, Malawian company BluWave Technology Ltd. has developed and patented a prototype of the “Superblu
Stove” which promises safe, highly cost-efficient and healthy, smoke-less cooking, but is still awaiting market
introduction. A South African model of a safe methanol stove is available through a network of Malawian distributors.
1 - Ethanol Stove Types
2 - Cooking with Ethanol
3 - Pros & Cons of
Ethanol Stoves
4 - Utilization in Malawi
5 - Alcohol-based Stoves
Best Practices
