Appropriate Energy-Saving Technologies

Increasing household access to clean energy and clean cooking solutions
2014 SEED Africa Award; European Union
Waste Management
Soroti Town
Uganda

Appropriate Energy Saving Technologies LTD (AEST) utilises local resources like agricultural bio-waste to manufacture charcoal briquettes. It markets its products in combination with fuel-efficient cook stoves, modified by the enterprise for household use. Local women and youth are employed to help produce, market and sell the goods. 

AEST hopes to transition to a more decentralised production model by contracting farmers to supply biochar which will be processed further by the enterprise to ensure briquette quality. 

Increasing community access to sustainable energy and improved cooking solutions has multiple benefits. Socially, the enterprise is helping to reduce illnesses related to smoke inhalation. It is also providing an alternative solution to women and children walking long distances to find fuel.

Eco-Inclusive Impacts
The enterprise helps to reduce illnesses related to smoke inhalation. It also provides an alternative solution to women and children walking long distances to find fuel, helping to create and sustain a local economy that empowers the community to use natural resources sustainably.
  • Improving public health by reducing respiratory diseases related to charcoal and firewood burning.
  • Reducing the distances women and children have to walk to find firewood for fuel, by providing a reliable delivery service. 
  • Decreasing deforestation for firewood.
  • Reducing greenhouse gases emitted through charcoal burning.
  • Reusing agricultural waste that is otherwise left to rot in fields or burnt.

 

  • Providing employment for 25 staff members and payments for 32 contracted farmers who supply bio-waste.
  • Creating a sustainable industry that involves the local community in all business aspects.

Partners

Appropriate Energy Saving Technologies works closely with local farmers in Uganda’s Teso District to provide households in the district with clean, sustainable cooking fuel. The farmers provide the enterprise with bio-waste which is used to manufacture the biomass briquettes. The enterprise then sells and distributes biomass charcoal briquettes and fuel-efficient cookstoves to local community groups.

Teso Women Development Initiative (TEWDI) is a Ugandan non-profit organisation formed by a group of women concerned about the region’s deforestation, scarcity of sustainable energy, gender-based violence and human rights abuses.

Appropriate Energy Saving Technologies LTD (AEST) was incorporated in 2012 and is the for-profit arm of TEWDI. Briquettes and cook stoves are the enterprise’s core products.

Harvest Fuel Initiative is a New York-based non-profit organisation that has provided USD 25,000 of seed funding to help grow the enterprise and provide technical production and business management assistance.

Shine Africa Foundation - Teso assists the enterprise locally by providing community education on deforestation, helping market AEST’s products, and garnering community feedback on their use.