Gold Standard visiting our cookstoves projects in Rwanda

In my last blog, I mentioned that our Rwanda cookstove and borehole projects had been selected by the Gold Standard to be part of a new video showcasing the multiple sustainable development benefits of Gold Standard certified projects.  It is with great pleasure that we share with you a few photos from Gold Standard’s visit to our improved cookstoves project in February.

We had the pleasure to meet with two families in Ngeruka sector, who kindly received us and shared their experience with our improved cookstove. Both families explained how the stove helped them save money by reducing their need for woodfuel and how the significant smoke level reduction positively impacted their health. They also described the growing interest in acquiring stoves in the community due to their multiple benefits.

Below are a few photos of the visit.

It is always a pleasure to meet with the beneficiaries of our projects and see the impacts of the stoves on the communities. We look forward to seeing the final video and sharing it on the blog soon!

Visiting the Rwanda Projects

This month I had the chance to visit our borehole projects in Kayonza district, Rwanda. Accompanied by our partners Rwandans4water, I went to visit three boreholes that were rehabilitated under our programme. The photos below were taken at Mutembo where we met with the community leader, who described the tremendous impact of the borehole on the wellbeing of the families.

Children of the community also showed us the stream that they used to collect water from before the project started. Rehabilitated in late 2015, Mutembo borehole is now providing safe drinking water for 180 families in the community eliminating the need to fetch wood for water purification. It is always a pleasure to see the impacts of our projects and we are thankful for the good work being carried out by our project partners and technicians.

In my next blog, I will share a sneak peek of the Gold Standard’s visit to Rwanda – we are proud to say that our projects were selected to be part of a new video showcasing the multiple sustainable development benefits of GS projects.

We will keep you posted!

Successful First Issuance of West Kisumu Small-scale Cookstoves Project in Kenya

This week at Co2balance we have had some good news for our improved cookstoves project in West Kisumu: it was issued for the first time since its implementation in 2011!
Over the course of the project, we distributed more than 1500 stoves to rural communities in the region. This was achieved through a collaboration with Umeme, a local women’s group that received training to manufacture the artisanal stoves from our staff in Kenya.

In addition to supporting the creation of a sustainable women-run micro business, the project has had very positive impacts in the communities, with beneficiaries reporting significant woodfuel savings, reduced levels of smoke, and a generally cleaner and safer cooking environment.

This first issuance of credits under the Gold Standard is a key milestone. We are all very happy about this achievement and hope for more positive news from West Kisumu in the near future.

 

We will keep you posted !

Good news for the climate this week

A few days away from the 22^nd session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 22), I thought I would share some good news. A report from PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) – Low Carbon Economy Index – found that the global carbon intensity (emissions per unit of GDP) fell by 2.8%, which can partly be attributed to a decrease in China’s coal consumption equivalent to a 6.4% fall in carbon intensity.

Although this 2.8% decrease is below what is required to stay within the two-degree global warming limit, the good news is that it happened during a year where economic growth was “healthy”. This further illustrates the shift towards decoupling economic growth and global carbon emissions.

This news comes just a few days before the entry into force of the Paris agreement on Friday 4^th of November. The achievement of the threshold of 55 countries accounting for at least 55% of total global greenhouse gas emissions in October, a key milestone, should hopefully pave the way for successful negotiations at COP 22 and ambitious climate action in the years ahead!

Introducing myself

Hello everyone,

A short post to introduce myself and express how happy and thankful I am to have joined such a nice team. I started at Co2balance a bit more than two weeks ago and it has been a great learning experience so far. I am truly impressed at how much is accomplished by such a small team. It reflects how dedicated, enthusiastic and knowledgeable people are here. I am looking forward to interacting with the rest of you over the next few months and contribute to some of the great work that is being carried out.

A bit more on my background, I recently graduated with a MSc in Environmental Management and Policy from Lund University in Sweden, after having completed an undergraduate degree in business. The place I call home is France, Montpellier in the South to be more precise, but I kind of feel home wherever the “wind takes me” like we often say in French. I have a passion for learning languages and traveling, which has led me to move around quite a lot in the past six years, mostly in Asia. Other than that, I enjoy fitness/running and photography. Below is a picture of me at a camel festival in Pushkar, India around 4 years ago.

Kelly