E105 Final Paper December 2008 Maritza Ruiz, Leon Liu, Dana Levine, Daniel Talancón, Esteban MendozaIntroduction With over 2 billion people today using biomass for cooking or heating, there has been much research into improving the inefficient, and hazardous, wood-burning stove. In Guatemala alone, one in five children dies before the age of five as a result of smoke inhalation1. In addition to respiratory problems, the traditional un-enclosed plancha type stoves is also a major cause of other long term illnesses such as eye diseases and physical injuries like burns2From our research experience, we have established many important issues we need to address dealing with the culture and people in Guatemala. In rural Guatemala, only women tend to the stove, as they are responsible for all the cooking of the household. Women work with these stoves for as much as 8 . Besides the health damages, the inefficient combustion that is the root cause of the smoke production discourages the efficient utilization of natural resources and can lead to deforestation. Therefore, a single solution that improves the operation of these wood-burning stoves can serve the dual purpose of improving the health and quality of life of the users and promoting environmental sustainability. With the principles of stove improvement and the features of prior successful examples in mind, we embarked on developing our own unique solution that would most effectively and feasibly address the situation in rural Guatemala. Market Definition and Hypotheses In designing a product for a wood burning stove, we must consider how we will market this product to our customers including cultural and cost considerations for our target markets. Major design specifications have been implemented in our final product design as a result of our marketing definitions, specifications and hypotheses developed. Target Markets We will focus our major design considerations on serving our primary market, with secondary markets being consequential: Primary Market – Rural Guatemalan villagers in the Lake Atitlán region using wood burning stoves in their homes Secondary Market – Business owners using wood burning stoves Other parts of rural Central America and worldwide Cultural Consideration and Human Factors 1 Dr. Mark Bryden, D. S. Design Principles for Wood Burning Cook Stoves. 2 Wood stoves. (2008). Retrieved 2008, from Ashden Awards for Sustainable Energy: http://www.ashdenawards.org/wood-stoveshours each day, and are constantly being exposed to the smoke. We have taken into consideration that the users of the stove are generally unwilling to change their cooking method. Further, these women are generally short and of limited upper body strength, so weight and comfort are major concerns. The door is adjacent to the burning wood, which will cause it to heat up. We have factored this into the design as not to burn the user. Safety of children is also a major issue, since they are often running in and out of the house, and we have included increased stability in our product for this. Also, we have considered ease of use, ease of manufacturing, and effective use of materials while making design changes. Cost Consideration The key factor driving our product development is its extremely low cost. The stove is a crucial aspect of a rural Guatemalan woman’s daily life because of the necessity of its use in feeding the family. With some rural Guatemalans earning as low as $1 a day, there is major resistance from villagers to completely tear down and rebuild a new stove, or even majorly modify their old stove, within their homes as this would result in high costs and stove downtime inconveniences. Market hypotheses We have made a few assumptions in designing our product for market: 1. People have wood-burning stoves. 2. Current stoves emit dangerous amounts of smoke. 3. People are aware of the health risks of chronic smoke exposure. 4. The wood burning stoves in rural Guatemala are of relatively uniform size and shape. 5. People are resistant to complete redesign of their existing stoves. 6. Potential customers have limited purchasing power. Market Research Substantial market research was performed in the villages to determine which factors are important to our potential customers; our findings played an integral role in driving our design and eventual business plan. With access to research conducted over the summer, we developed a good basis of understanding regarding the current stove situation (See appendix). Given the cultural context of Pasajquim, we are well aware that the stove is used exclusively by the women of the village. Thus, our studies focus on the perspective of these women, who are responsible for large families and must have the stoves running for an average of 11 hours per day. The majority of wood-burning stoves have very similar dimensions, with the metal plancha, chimney, and other features being a relatively standard size. This uniformity in design means that we could potentially develop accessories that would be compatible with most current stoves in Pasajquim. Due to the limited income of the target market that averagesabout Q900/month, our solution must be extremely low cost, which should involve small modifications to the existing stoves rather than requiring their complete demolition and reconstruction. Currently, the people of Pasajquim pay over $35 per month for firewood, accounting for about a third of their income being spent firewood alone. With the rising cost of firewood in the region, it is certainly important to help minimize their consumption of wood for saving money and promoting sustainability. In the early fall, we performed additional market research to gain further insight on how concerned the villagers are with the smoke produced and whether they’d consider modifying their stove to improve its efficiency (See appendix). Much to our surprise, we noted that people were not only aware of the dangerous amounts of smoke being exhausted directly into their houses, but would also being willing to pay for a modification to their stove in order to mitigate this issue. Marketing Specifications As a result of marketing research considerations, we have created a list of marketing specifications useful in creating a successful product Marketing Specifications Price $3-$5 Features Smoke reduction within user’s home Decreased food preparation time Decreased wood