The Enugu State Government  has designed and produced an innovative green energy and safe cooking stoves meant to secure Nigeria and Africa from deforestation and ecosystem losses.

The stove, which is known as Enugu Stove, is designed 100 per cent local content and meant to use smokeless and odourless coal briquette to produce heat for cooking.

Commissioner for Innovation, Science and Technology, Dr Lawrence Eze, disclosed this to newsmen in Enugu on Tuesday.

Eze said that the innovative stove, whose design was fabricated by Scientific Equipment Development Institute (SEDI), remained unique due to its human and environmental safety features.

He noted that with the stove, days of gas explosion and explosion from adulterated kerosene use in kerosene-stoves at homes and eateries are gone.

According to him, “sometimes if there are no fatalities, the degrees of body burns from such explosions are unimaginable; and this is the principal thing the stove is meant to solve.”

He explained that the stove has two chambers, adding that the burning chamber is well-insulated from the outer chamber even when the heat and cooking is on-going.

The commissioner said that on economic benefit, the stove is a one-off (one time) buy and the coal briquette, which would be a recurring buy, is cheap and got from purified and dehydro-carbonised coal that Enugu is blessed with.

“On economic value, it is the most economical source of energy and fuel for cooking. It is cheaper than gas and kerosene; while electricity is a no go area due to its cost for now.

“It is odourless and does not transmit smoke unlike a kerosene stove because it has two components, the inner component and the outer component.

“It is the inner component that retains the heat. It is just like a flask.

“There is a well-insulated vacuum between the inner component (or chamber) and the outer component (or chamber). So the void (well-insulated area) between the two makes it difficult for heat to be transmitted.

“While the coal briquette is heating up and boiling water or items being cooked; you can hug or touch the outer component (chamber) and it is still as cool as possible,” he said.

The commissioner said that the energy produced burns in a gentle manner like one is using an electric stove and “you only notice the boiling and cooked item producing steam”.

He said, “The stove, which is produced in three sizes – student, family and commercial/eatery sizes – is designed not to allow heat losses, which increases the temperature of the immediate environment in the usual cooking kitchen or location.

“God has blessed Enugu State with an enormous and abundant quantity of coal, which is largely untapped.

“Enugu State Government has duly applied to the Federal Government for the coal to be mined.

“This is why Gov. Peter Mbah, has set-up the Ministry of Energy and Solid Minerals to see to this and give the state a sustainable energy mix meant to ensure a green environment and ecological protection.”

Eze said that the new ministry would get investors that would mine the coals, while his ministry would get quantities of the coals, at a reasonable cost, to the coal briquette producing factories.

According to him, the four factories, one in each senatorial zone, will refine the raw coal into smokeless and odourless coal briquettes for the stove use and ensure its availability, affordability and accessibility.

“It will definitely stop the radical felling of trees in our communities; environmental hazard of production of charcoal; and protect our vegetation, forest and ecosystem in general,” he added.