Summary

The Rocket Box stove is a transportable high-efficiency stove, developed by AIDG as a lower-cost, pre-fabricated alternative to common masonry stove models. The design was heavily influenced by previous work done by Aprovecho, an Oregon based non-profit that has done extensive research on stove designs for developing countries. XelaTeco, AIDG’s first incubated business in Guatemala, currently manufactures and sells the Rocket Box to individuals, cooperatives and NGOs.

The Good

The Rocket Box uses 50-60% less firewood than traditional cookstoves and open fires (verified by AIDG in burn testing). This provides a huge costs savings for families that buy fuel wood. For instance, women we interviewed at San Alfonso, a farming cooperative in Western Guatemala, reported spending 28-56% of their monthly income on wood.

This stove design shows similar fuel efficiency to masonry stoves, the most common ‘improved’ stove model available to off-grid communities in Guatemala. Due lower labor and materials costs, the Rocket Box is up to 50% cheaper. Like masonry stoves, it comes equipped with a metal plancha for making tortillas, a staple in Guatemalan home cooking. To cut exposure to the ‘killer in the kitchen’, it has a metal chimney or stovepipe that vents smoke out of the home.

Demoing the Rocket Box at the Feria Ecologica

Being portable (it can be carried by two people), the Rocket Box is particularly useful in communities where residents are living in temporary housing and/or want more flexibility in where the stove is placed in their home. Masonry stoves tend to be cemented in place and cannot be moved once installed.

The Bad

Wood needs to be cut into smaller pieces than typically used in traditional open fire. This is not too much extra work for someone skilled with a machete. (See instructions for how to use below.)

Some users initially found the combustion chamber to be small for their liking. This was generally due to the misconception that a lot of wood was necessary to get adequate cooking power. As users got used to how the stove worked and consumed firewood, this complaint tended to disappear.

Priced at $100-$150, many of the families who would most benefit from this tech may still need creative financing to make it affordable. XelaTeco is working with communities, AIDG and other NGOs to figure out adequate funding mechanisms.

Decision: Tech transferred to XelaTeco

For customers who have to buy, rather than gather firewood, the Rocket Box is a great long-term cost saving device. It has the additional advantages of being portable and venting smoke from the home.

Compared to masonry stoves, Rocket Box stoves are much less labor intensive to produce, use fewer materials to construct, and have a shorter installation time. These three characteristics keep the stove’s cost relatively low. The price is still out of reach of many of the families that XelaTeco would want to serve and creative financing would be necessary to reach a greater slice of the potential customer base.

This stove design can be mass-produced and distributed in local markets like Xela’s Democracia for direct sale to consumers. XelaTeco is exploring these options.