According to WHO, about 3.2 million people globally die from indoor pollution every year. In Kenya 23000 the majority being women and living on less than $2 PPP die from indoor pollution - (Kenya Medical Research Institute). These deaths are brought about by health complications arising from the unsafe burning of biomass fuels such as charcoal, kerosene, firewood and dung during cooking. To solve this problem, a cleaner and affordable alternative to these biomass fuels is needed.Today, about 300 million tons of plastic are produced each year across the globe. Africa generates about 16 million tons annually while Nairobi produces about 2,400 tons per day (oecd.org). Due to a lack of proper waste collection programs, these plastic waste ends up in landfills or strewn in drainage systems or besides the roads degrading the surrounding environment. However, plastics can be converted to a clean gas with no pollutants or emissions and with a high calorific value meaning it burns longer providing a cheaper alternative to biomass fuels.
Our innovation is a plastic waste to clean cooking gas solution dubbed “Mega Gas”. We aggregate and collect plastic waste from households and landfills then convert it into a clean cooking gas through a patented thermal cracking process and resell it back to the community using a distribution network of women entrepreneurs. Our customers access the gas by purchasing our branded canisters or by using our fully kitted community kitchens at a fee.Mega Gas targets low income households earning less than $2 PPP providing them with an alternative cooking fuel that is safe, affordable, accessible and environmentally friendly. Compared to LPG, a 6kg canister of Mega Gas is 50% cheaper and has a 25% higher calorific value. Compared to traditional sources of fuel like biomass, Mega Gas is cleaner posing no hazard of indoor pollution. Moreover, our users can pay on-demand ($0.2/hr) to access a fully kitted community kitchen with stoves for cooking thereby providing choice and reducing upfront costs related to purchasing gas canisters. Mega Gas thus improves the health outcomes of low income households especially women and children, saves them money and removes dangerous pollutants from the environment namely plastics.
I grew up in one of the biggest Slums in Nairobi called Soweto, My family consisted of 7 brothers and 2 sisters. My Siblings and I had to walk very far to fetch firewood, and after walking miles to and fro, we would finally bring back firewood home when our mother started cooking the whole kitchen would be full of smoke, causing my mother to choke and suffer serious respiratory illnesses. My mother was not alone, all of the people within Soweto suffered from energy poverty. I knew that I had to look for and innovate a solution for this problem and that is how we started converting plastic waste into clean cooking gas to fight indoor pollution. I believe that Innovation and technology have the ability to transform communities. I have been an entrepreneur most of my life, I believe in my leadership ability to mobilize and optimize resources to scale our innovation so that we can serve more people. Having faced the problem of indoor pollution first-hand, I am always motivated to tackle this global challenge.
We are embedded in both households and the larger community. Our clean cooking gas is accessible by both family units and the public at a central community kitchen. This means that at the most important social gatherings, we are building both the hard and soft infrastructure necessary to keep climate change at the center of local conversations. As a matter of fact, our theory of change targets the knowledge, practices, and attitudes of our customers including host communities where we operate the community kitchens. We are shifting their perceptions about waste management, particularly on plastic pollution. we do this because we believe the best amd sustainable use case of a hardware solution is when the intended user is helped to have the right software [awareness/attitude/behavior change].