Thursday, April 16, 2009

Climate change and smoking stoves

Some of my research investigates the link between child health and smoke from cooking fires in Indonesian homes. A lot of research has investigated the link in different ways in different countries, and many have found that the smoke contributes to acute respiratory infections, which is one of the leading causes of child death in the developing world. Today an article in the New York Times notes that the same cook fires are a huge contributor to climate change; in fact, providing people with clean-burning stoves will save a lot of fuel and eliminate a lot of emissions. The stoves aren't free, but it looks like they're sure worth the investment!