Clean Cookstoves Double as Cell Chargers in the Philippines and China

Jaqueline Nguyen is the founder of Energant, a company that converts heat into electricity with clean-burning cookstoves aptly named KleanKook. Through her 2014 CGI University commitment and the work of Energant, Nguyen hopes to provide people in disaster-prone areas of the Philippines with this technology that not only uses renewable energy to accomplish the daily task of cooking, but also harnesses the excess heat to provide electricity for basic utility needs. Currently, Energant is piloting 10 wood- and coal-fueled models of the stove in the Philippines to identify how best to engineer a more resilient, robust technology that will stand the test of time and outlast natural disasters. "We realized how crucial it is to not only design a user-friendly stove in terms of usability when the stove is functional, but also to design one in terms of ease of repair," says Nguyen.

The KleanKook model allows users to plug their cellphones into the stoves and charge them from the heat produced during cooking. The stove thus creates a clean and affordable energy source, while also preventing people from inhaling the harmful smoke caused by cooking fires.