Household Energy Access for Cooking and Heating
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Once a household energy program is operational and generating emission reductions, involving carbon finance creates new financing opportunities. In particular, as each generation of cookstoves generates carbon revenues that can be used to incentivize the next generation, a sustainable revolving funding mechanism that is independent from further donor funding can potentially be established. Involving carbon finance also means systematic monitoring and verification of the achieved outcomes for emissions reductions. This can be combined with monitoring sustainable development benefits, since it is already the practice in the Community development Carbon Fund of the World Bank’s CFU. This strong performance orientation can increase the attractiveness of carbon-based programs for the required donor funding in the ramp-up phase.
Methodological Issues In most of the existing carbon finance schemes, including the CDM, the technical aspects of the project and the quantification of the emission reductions are based on standard approaches and methodologies. At the moment, in the CdM several methodologies are available that could apply to technologies that supply household-level cooking and heating solutions. These methodologies cover the following:
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Activities to displace the use of nonrenewable biomass by introducing renewable energy technologies. examples of these technologies include, but are not limited to, biogas stoves, solar cookers, and passive solar homes. Activities to improve the thermal efficiency appliances using nonrenewable biomass. examples of these technologies and measures include the introduction of high–efficiency, biomass-fired cookstoves, or ovens or dryers, and/or the improvement of energy efficiency of existing biomass-fired cookstoves, or ovens or dryers. Activities to generate renewable thermal energy using renewable biomass or biogas for use that is replacing fossil fuel consumption in residential, commercial, and institutional applications (for example, for supply to households, small farms or for use in built environment of institutions such as schools). examples of these technologies include but are not limited to biogas cookstoves, biomass briquette cookstoves, small-scale baking and drying systems, water heating, or space heating systems. Activities that support the recovery and destruction of methane from manure and wastes from agricultural activities that normally would be decaying anaerobically, hence emitting methane to the atmosphere (for example, where the farmer would have used an open lagoon for storing manure).
Besides the CDM, there is also the voluntary market that offers its own approaches that are sometimes simpler than the ones used in the CDM, or that allow more flexibility. However, the overall volume of the voluntary market is very limited in size and can currently provide a testing ground for pilots rather than a basis for large-scale programs. The application of CdM and other methodologies creates new challenges. For example, CdM projects that aim to replace nonrenewable biomass are expected by the methodology to estimate the average annual consumption of woody biomass per appliance and, for this consumed biomass, determine the share of renewable and nonrenewable