URGENT: Best commercial small heating/cooking solution for refugees

Happy new year (not!)

Refugees are freezing to death today in the Greek camp where I am going.

They are waiting to register in a line that is 5 days long. It snowed and they have no shelter. Only the clothes on their back.

They are burning plastic and anything they can find to keep warm.

Can anybody recommend a cheap and commercially available rocket stove for heating and/or cooking?

Or, if you have a darn good model and you can ship it to Greece at a reasonable price in the next 2 weeks, I am interested in buying it. Talk to me! Abclaudia at yahoo doc com

do they have natural resources they can use? can they find clay and make cob? what is the area like so that we may help?
maybe this permies link may help? survival rocket stove
maybe you could print out some of the survival ideas over to them so that they may use them to work out a survival rocket mass heater.

Claudia Effe : There are many good commercially built stoves that evolved directly from work down by NGOs. Here is on that is certainly in the Top Ten! Link below :

http://stovetecstore.net

This is best used as

1) a complete stove package

2) Very frugally burns all types of dry Woody Biomass

3) Should never be asked to burn plastics


As F. Styles says what are the local resources, not much ! This is not a question of any lack of Diversified skills, or even training, this is Alien to all life experiences

for these people !


40% of the worlds population still is doing all the Cooking, Water Heating and Cleaning over smoky very inefficient 3-Rock Fires - For over 50 Years NGOs have failed

to meet Those peoples needs! For 50+ years Waves of NGOs have shown up with 1st World Technology, that can not be duplicated in 3rd world counties. Result failure!


Often a team of 1st World experts is brought in to teach a core of Indigenous people how to run a small metal bending shop to make stoves ranging from very crude

up to and including Wonders like the Stovetec stoves !


Generally This enterprise is pushed into existence as a way of supporting the local population with locally produced products, that are superior to the traditional 3-rock

fire! The goal here is to sell these units and thus also provide JOBs for a percent of the local population ! In Truth, most Rocket Stove devises are so-much more

efficient and cleaner burning that these Rockets soon ''pay for themselves'' in labor saved and the price of the fuel saved due to their Initial high efficiencies.


Often subsequent failures of these Grand Schemes are related to 1) lack of Training on correct use of this cooking unit, or, 2) The newly trained craftsmen who see

''their job'' as simply turning out more and more stoves gradually disregarding Quality control for the production quota they see as their goal to line their pockets .


The most common end result for the House wife is the eventual failure of their Rocket, The NGO is long gone at this point the housewife berates the local craftsmen,

and tells her friends that the cost of the Rocket stove is not worth the long term gain ! Result is often the return to the 3-rock fire still used by 40% of the worlds

population.


This cycle has been repeated again and again for over 50 years world wide. The few long term successes are where a local housewife was individually taught to make

her own Rocket Stove - - - - Because she was taught to make her own R. S. she knows exactly how to fix it - For this reason it is truly better if the stoves are made

out of Adobe or Cob, These materials Clay Sand and some straw are available world wide !

For more information on the NGOs still working on this problem a great source is ''Aprovecho.org''. Note that ''Aprovecho.net'' is a sustainable living learning/teaching/training

facility in Oregon, they are still loosely affiliated !

I am sorry That this message can not be more positive, On a further downer I strongly advise that you take any video from U-tube and rocket stoves with a large grain

of salt - - - Their are Huge boatloads of Stinking Steaming Crap Videos on U- Tube, some actually dangerous to try to recreate !

You have been given a unique opportunity, it is highly likely your greatest gift will not be the working of large Miracles but simply in the power of your presence !

GOOD LUCK ! For The Crafts! Big AL

allen lumley wrote:

As F. Styles says what are the local resources, not much !

For over 50 Years NGOs have failed

to meet Those peoples needs! For 50+ years Waves of NGOs have shown up with 1st World Technology, that can not be duplicated in 3rd world counties. Result failure!


Often a team of 1st World experts is brought in to teach a core of Indigenous people how to run a small metal bending shop to make stoves


supporting the local population with locally produced products, that are superior to the traditional 3-rock

fire! The goal here is to sell these units and thus also provide JOBs for a percent of the local population !

Often subsequent failures of these Grand Schemes are related to 1) lack of Training on correct use of this cooking unit, or, 2) The newly trained craftsmen who see

''their job'' as simply turning out more and more stoves gradually disregarding Quality control for the production quota they see as their goal to line their pockets .


The most common end result for the House wife is the eventual failure of their Rocket, The NGO is long gone at this point the housewife berates the local craftsmen,

and tells her friends that the cost of the Rocket stove is not worth the long term gain ! Result is often the return to the 3-rock fire still used by 40% of the worlds

population.


This cycle has been repeated again and again for over 50 years world wide. The few long term successes are where a local housewife was individually taught to make

her own Rocket Stove - - - - Because she was taught to make her own R. S. she knows exactly how to fix it - For this reason it is truly better if the stoves are made

out of Adobe or Cob, These materials Clay Sand and some straw are available world wide !

Al said so many good things i dont even know where to start. im not big on NGOs... my experience is a bunch of to say it as nice as i can... the best unintended consequences you cant buy. i wont digress on that but can agree strongly on local and personal help. when you have personal help you see it personal and take it personal and see it through. the age old moral of give a man a fish and he eats for a day, but teach him how to fish and you feed him for a life time.

if Al says there are no resources then i am going to question is there even wood to burn even if they had the best wood stove you could buy... i mean you said they are burning plastic so how are they going to use a rocket stove let alone any heating device?

i agree 100% in teaching them how to use local resources to make their own rocket stove and create a type of "A-team" that you can teach and then they go out into the refugee camp and teach others. this can not only save peoples lives but also stimulate creativity and economy that they may be able to work in trade with one another in building helping fixing and providing resources among themselves with these self made rocket style locally and natural made rocket stoves.

if you asked my advice this is how i would give it. i have been in management for many years, owned my owned businesses and have retired to permaculture lifestyle and live closer to nature so i would manage it like this:

if you live close and can personally go to these refugee camps or know someone that is close and willing to:

1 learn what local natural resources can be used to build a rocket stove and review all the natural built rocket stoves so you may adapt it to that area.

2 take that knowledge and go to the refugee camp and speak to the the most mechanically inclined group of 5 folks that can speak in your language and their language because communication is key.

3 train them on the natural built rocket stove with the local materials.

4 send them out to teach other teams of 5 and so on.

5 stick with it to see it through with the first "A team" answering questions and then it will basically grow its self.

Claudia Effe & F Styles : Really and truly We have a country Syria that attempted a major Agricultural Change to total self -sufficiency, while greatly increasing the

Production of Long staple Cotton - And all of this in the middle of a major regional Drought ! The farmers attempted to make up the difference by pumping the water

shortfall from the regions aquifer !

The Aquafer sunk in some regions by 100's of meters, and All drilling needed permits from the ''Central government '' Here the needed Drilling permits were passed

out as Plums if you were the right religion (often christian) Had the right friends, or had deep pockets - something farmers are not noted for !

This was the start of the regions recent collapse into another failed state .

As the farms failed the people fled to the cities, creating further calls for aid from the central government who prioritized ''taking care of our own '' and answering

unrest with Brutal Repression !

As Claudia says these people arrive in Greece only in the clothes they stand up in - and those will be wet and salty - this means that they MUST be rinsed ! Failure to

achieve that 1 goal means that the salt will actually draw moisture out of the air and keep there cloths dry Expect to see chilblains and ''trench foot'' so severe that

the subjects can not totter more than a few feet and that painfully !

Any major trash garbage tip/dump is a potential goldmine of materials, if i was in their shoes I would band together with friends and physically move in. - This may no

longer be possible !


I am adding this link here for general purposes :


http://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/index.ssf/2011/03/from_cottage_grove_to_darfur_aprovecho_research_center_sends_cookstoves_to_ease_the_humanitarian_cri.html


You can Google Aprovecho Industrial cook stoves, this almost qualifies as a success story except a recent policy change now means that instead of recycling local

materials, precut pieces are sent to 3rd wold countries to assemble in a monkey see monkey do - - - It appears there is little training or supervision for the operators !

Big AL !

the problems that were in syria that caused this are much more than resource and agriculture mismanagement and are unfortunate and according to the topic not the bottom line at this moment and can be debated all day.

the question at hand is "recommend a cheap and commercially available rocket stove for heating and/or cooking?" but ... is that the right question?

if the Claudia is correct in that they are burning plastic and Al is correct that they dont have the resources to burn then is offering stoves going to help when they have no wood to burn?

we can send them cheap and commercially available rocket stoves for heating and/or cooking all day but will they be able to use them?

another question is will they be sent fuel with the rocket stoves sent to them to burn also?

i have a question and maybe we can start here? do they have a trash problem? if they do what kind of trash? if the trash they have is bio waste the maybe we need to ask the question can they be sent bio waste burners that are ecco safe and affordable since they may not have fuel resources? this would do multiple things in that it would take care of any bio wast problems to clean up the place and be used for heating and cooking.

in addition to that idea can we ask if there are any ways to build bio mass burners with natural resources that are easy to teach to refugees?

Hi Claudia
I see this post is a few months old but just checking whether you found a solution for rocket stoves for the Greek refugee camps. If not I may be able to assist.
Thanks, Tracy

Is this just a solution for the "Greek refugees" what about a solution for the refugees in the middle of France, Germany, Sweden, America and now Canada.

Morning

No - not at all. The Greek refugee camps were specifically mentioned by Claudia hence my response.

Thanks, Tracy

absolutely, you dont want to forget about all the refugees going to Canada!