Clean cooking technology: tales from the hearth
Student name: Ms Tashi Bourai
Guide: Dr Gopal K Sarangi
Year of completion: 2017
Host Organisation: The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), New Delhi
Supervisor (Host Organisation): Dr Preeti Jain Das
Abstract: A household survey to understand the choice of clean cooking fuel as a cultural
construct was carried out in Noorpur village located in the Gurgaon district,
Haryana. The sampled households taken for the survey conducted covered a
heterogeneous population belonging to different income groups, educational
background, caste, household size, origin and land holding.
The prevalence and availability of traditional energy sources- firewood, crop
residue and cow dung cake were found in the village where these three fuels were
mainly used for cooking food on the traditional chulha. There is also an
inexhaurible shift towards LPG within these households, but the transition to
cleaner fuels is yet to take place even in the households who are making use of
LPG. The reliance on solid fuels even if bare minimum still exists. Factors like
income and land holding influence the choice of fuel for cooking in these sampled
households whereas caste does not appear as a determining factor for the choice
of fuel.
Keywords: Firewood, Crop residue, Cowdung cake, Traditional Chulha, LPG,
Cooking Fuel.
