Salvadoran wins prestigious prize for efficient, clean stove, but loses wife, family, life savings

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http://www.latimes.com/search/la-fi-stoveguy28nov28,0,5628086.story?page=1

"It's a stainless-steel cooker that uses about 95% less fuel than conventional wood stoves, with minimal pollution. It would seem to be a can't-miss technology in a country where millions still cook with wood and most forests have been destroyed... The device has garnered Nuñez a prestigious environmental prize. It has earned him a U.S. patent. And it has won fans among some Salvadoran peasants who no longer spend a good chunk of their days hunting for firewood and the rest inhaling cooking smoke... It has also wrecked Nuñez's marriage, alienated two of his three children and swallowed his life savings."

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. I always hate to hear about the hardships of these inventors :^( So sad

[wuushew]

2. The article says he married into wealth

so it may very well be that his wife was a bitch.

This man is a true humanitarian, I hope his invention is distributed far and wide.

[noamnety]

6. There's no reason for the misogynistic slur here.

Can you take your sexist vocab somewhere else?

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

7. I'm offended by your word "humanitarian."

It insults our friends, the animals.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

3. Just the thing...

For campers, worldwide.

[blogslut]

4. Here's what I would do if I were advising that man

Find a proper fuel alternative for it and play up the emissions savings that way. Instead of wood coal, why not coal made from bamboo? Bamboo is a rapidly-replenishing resource and it can grow anywhere. I know Mexico is working very hard to become competitive with China as a supplier of Bamboo. Seems to me El Salvador can grow bamboo too. That was, the trees are saved and the lungs of the stove's users are saved.

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5. Good thinking

[blogslut]

8. Thanks

I am in love with bamboo. You can do anything with it and it grows super fast. I did a wee bit of research and El Salvador totally produces bamboo. Heck, people could grow their own supply. There have been bamboo culms known to grow as much as a foot in a day. It also is a great windbreak and helps correct soil erosion.

I know. Some people hate it because it's virtually unkillable because of the root system but if it's planted correctly with stops inserted into the ground to keep the rhizomes from taking over, it's all good.

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10. The pandas think it's tasty

[blogslut]

11. Yes

Of course, the kind of bamboo leaves the Panda eats are completely different than the kind that is used to produce flooring, fuel, ect. There are at least 1000 varieties of bamboo. The problem for the Panda is not the cultivation of bamboo but that the wood forests surrounding them are being devastated by commercial interests. And I won't even go into all the other ways China is ruining it's natural resources and abusing its citizens.

That's another reason to promote bamboo cultivation worldwide. It's not a replacement for wood forests but it can be used instead of wood.

[muriel_volestrangler]

9. He needs to get the production cost down

Green groups aren't lining up like he thought they would to fund his technology. He has won occasional grants to manufacture a few stoves for poor families such as the Erazos. A contractor makes them for him for $325. His own company can't do it because he no longer has a company or employees. Nuñez is broke.
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Even admirers say Nuñez's cautiousness is largely to blame for the fact that his cooker is still locked in the lab. American environmental consultant Lilia Abron, who promotes green technology in the developing world, said she could sell plenty of Turbococinas if Nuñez would just get them into mass production.

She traveled to El Salvador to view a prototype last year and was thrilled with the stove's efficiency and minimal smoke. She said she urged the inventor to hook up with a major appliance manufacturer to lower the cost, but to no avail.

"The market is there," said an exasperated Abron, a chemical engineer and founder of Washington-based Peer Consultants. "He just won't let it go."

$325 is too much. From the look and description of it, it should be manufacturable for a lot less. A modification so that it doesn't depend on electricity might be good, too (a hand-cranked fan system?)

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12. You're right.

Or, at least some company should buy the patent from him for a huge amount of money, and make these refinements to it so that can be mass-manufactured.