Justa cookstoves for Guatemala, El Salvador and Nicaragua
The Justa cookstove (pronounced “hoo-stuh”) is built in place inside the home by local stove technicians trained by StoveTeam. Each stove benefits an average family of nearly 8 people and provides meaningful employment, while contributing toward a solution to climate change and deforestation.
The Justa cookstove reduces smoke inside the home to nearly zero, uses half as much wood as an open fire, and saves up to 15 tons of CO2 from entering the atmosphere over its lifespan, equal to the total yearly output of the average American. Each family is directly involved in building their stove, leading to greater community adoption and project sustainability.
“The stove is beautiful! I think it’s going to save us a lot of firewood. The cooking surface is excellent too.”
Our stoves are saving lives and forests
A stove transforms a kitchen into a safe place where a family can come together for years to come. Each stove can be placed and monitored for five years for under $200 and saves an average family of five to eight people from the dangers of smoke and burns, while saving 50% of fuel wood and preventing up to 15 tons of CO2 from entering the atmosphere, equivalent to the average American’s entire yearly carbon footprint!
Built by local technicians, trained by StoveTeam
Following our history of helping local people to build and distribute stoves, we are now training a network of technicians called Maestros Comaleros, or Master Stovebuilders, who can build and service Justa cookstoves in their own communities. This approach, coupled with sourcing materials locally, provides meaningful employment and stimulates economies in areas that need it most.
“I am grateful because I get to show the world that I can change my life, improve my economy, and give the best for my son. With StoveTeam I have been able to get ahead, and I am proud to be part of a project that has improved so many lives. ”
See exactly where your stove will go
The map below shows the exact locations of Justa stoves built by StoveTeam in Guatemala. This helps us revisit stoves for maintenance, but it also allows us to connect you with the towns and regions you’re helping to turn toward a culture of safe cooking.
This interactive map is centered on the region of San Martín Jilotepeque, where we kicked off our goal to provide Justa cookstoves for 5,000 households!
A stove for all of Central America
The ultimate goal of StoveTeam's Justa stove pilot project is to create a system that can be scaled up to meet the needs of every family cooking over open fires in Central America.
To accomplish this, we are:
Empowering local people to build stoves in their own communities. This makes it possible to tap into a crucial local perspective.
Engaging families to help with the process of building their own stove. This helps to ensure adoption of the stove, and energizes the family to share the stove with their friends.
Recording over a dozen data points for each family, including the exact GPS location of each stove. This allows us to visualize data for each region, to understand trends and analyze our approaches.
Carefully documenting all strategies and policies in an open-source handbook, available for anyone interested in becoming a stove technician or starting a stove project in their area.
“Dr. Larry Winiarski made a ‘perfect’ Rocket stove when he designed the Justa stove with Mike Hatfield and Peter Scott. The refractory ceramic tile, called a baldosa, that makes up the combustion chamber is thin walled and surrounded by wood ash [or pumice], a great natural insulation. The griddle sits on top of wood ash and the narrow channel gap under the griddle forces the hot gases to efficiently pass into the steel. This is a stove that is designed for making tortillas and warming multiple pots of food. Since it has a chimney the damaging smoke passes up and out of the kitchen protecting the health of the family. Hundreds of thousands of Justa type stoves have been made and cooked a lot of food!
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How it’s made
Before construction, a technician visits the home to ensure that the Justa will be placed correctly and that the family will properly maintain the stove. The family then builds a base for the stove using StoveTeam’s construction guide, and finds a local person or family member to help StoveTeam’s technician build the stove itself.
StoveTeam provides all materials and employs a local technician to build the Justa stove inside the home. Materials include bricks, a plancha cooktop, ceramic pieces for the firebox, and a chimney. At the time of installation, StoveTeam geo-locates the stove using GPS and provides the family with a proper use and maintenance guide including the contact information for a local technician or stove project. We revisit stoves six months after installation, and then again after one year, to ensure the stove is functioning well and being used properly.
The Justa cookstove reduces smoke inside the home to nearly zero, uses half as much wood as an open fire, and saves up to 15 tons of CO2 from entering the atmosphere over its lifespan, nearly the total yearly output of the average American.