MUSINGS FROM PRIYADARSHINI KARVE: Can wood burn without smoke?

The answer is, YES! 

A couple of weeks ago, I briefly talked about the new version of the Electricity Less Forced Draft stove (check here). I feel very proud about this new product in our range. I urge everyone reading the blog to please help us spread the word! 

It is a universally accepted fact that forced draft gasification is the only way to burn wood and other solid biomass fuels with minimum pollution. Most forced draft stoves available in the market use electricity driven fan or blower, to force air into the wood fire for cleaner burning. ELFD is our own innovation based on steam power, and does not require any electricity, battery, or fan! 

Furthermore, the ELFD concept allows us to bring in greater user friendliness into gasifier stoves. We can operate the stove in both natural and forced draft modes as and when required, and combining this feature with control of fuel feeding allows us to switch between HIGH and LOW flame - a feature that is non-existent in any other gasifier stove!  

Of course going from concept to a product always has many twists and turns, and we are on this journey for the last couple of years. What we now have can be called the second generation of this stove. We are launching three models of the Samuchit ELFD Sampada Smokess Stove. The stoves can burn pieces of wood, briquettes, pellets, waste biomass like coconut shells, date seeds, etc., as well as woody agricultural waste like cotton stalks, corn cobs, etc. 

ELFD Sampada - Household Model (MRP: INR 7,000)

ELFD Sampada - Small Eatery Model (MRP: INR 12,000)

ELFD Sampada - Institutional Model (MRP: INR 27,000)

The Household model is good for household level cooking. In addition, being portable, it can be a good camping/trekking stove for a group of 8-10 people. The Small Eatery model is well suited for small restaurants, caterers or mid-day meals for small rural schools (about 20-50 students). The institutional model is well suited for old age homes, orphanages, hostels, charitable institutes, etc., where food is cooked for 50-100 people daily. These stoves provide a quality of cooking energy that is close to LPG, but using any type of biomass fuels available locally. With daily use, the cost of each stove will be recovered in about 6 months or so.

We have been experimenting with these new designs over the last week or so in our own office, and my excitement keeps on increasing! Yesterday I have uploaded a video showing the basic operation of this revolutionary technology in clean cooking. Please check it out here. 

Thanks to the innovation award that we won last year for the ELFD technology from Nexus, we are in a position to offer some interesting add-ons and discounts, particularly for not-for-profit kitchens, for a limited period. For more information and placing orders, write to us on samuchit@samuchit.com!

Priyadarshini Karve

Director

Samuchit Enviro Tech

#BeModernBeResponsibleBeRespectful

    Samuchit Enviro Tech.     samuchit@samuchit.com     www.samuchit.com 

Musings from Priyadarshini Karve: Sampada ELFD Gen II!

We had launched Sampada ELFD stove for institutional cooking last year, and it has generated a lot of excitement wherever we have demonstrated it. You can also see a video of its operation on our YouTube channel. We are now bringing a second generation of the Sampada ELFD stove, which is much simpler to operate, is more versatile for different types of cooking operation, and cost wise is on par with the simplest electricity powered forced draft stoves available in the market. What is more, we now also have a stove model for households! 

Sampada ELFD is a forced draft stove - it uses artificially controlled air flow to introduce excess air in the fuel chamber, to help burn up the hot combustible gases and particulates, with minimal emissions. This is the only way a solid biomass burning stove can meet the air quality standards prescribed by the World Health Organisation. In most forced draft stoves, the draft is produced with the help of a fan or a blower run by electric power. In the simplest designs the fan/blower is powered simply by plugging into the wall socket, just as we run a table fan, on grid electricity. More sophisticated designs incorporate a fan or blower run on a battery, which can be charged by either grid electricity or by solar PV etc. 

There is currently one very sophisticated stove in the market, which uses the heat of the stove to charge a battery, which can run the fan and also charge a cell phone. 

All of these designs were developed based on the assumption that we need forced draft, and the only way to achieve it is to use a fan/blower. The focus was on the 'means' rather than the 'end result'. We focused on the end result, and explored other avenues of creating forced draft. In nature, wind is created by pressure difference in the air. So we used a process that comes closer to nature, and does not require either grid power or electricity. In our system, the heat of the stove is used for generating pressurised steam, which is released in a jet at the entrance to the fuel chamber where normally a fan or blower would be attached. The steam jet creates a pressure differential, and pulls in air along with it, giving us the desired effect. 

Our collaborators, Electrofabrik, must of course get the main credit for the development of the ELFD mechanism. The engineering inputs that have gone into this ingenious design have come entirely from them. 

I have written in the musings before about how we need to shift the focus to the 'service' provided, rather than the obvious source for providing the service. There are always various ways to achieve the same end result, and exploring these can lead to interesting options. The way Sampada ELFD design has come about is a good example of this. 

Check our youtube link <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDuUQ8l5c68> and <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvgb1u2FpKw> to watch the functionality of the stove.

Priyadarshini Karve

Director

Samuchit Enviro Tech

#BeModernBeResponsibleBeRespectful

    Samuchit Enviro Tech.     samuchit@samuchit.com     www.samuchit.com