Almost one-in-three people globally will still be mainly using polluting cooking fuels in 2030, research shows

Date:
October 4, 2021
Source:
University of Exeter
Summary:
Almost one-in-three people around the world will still be mainly
using polluting cooking fuels and technologies-- a major source of
disease and environmental destruction and devastation -- in 2030,
new research warned.



FULL STORY ========================================================================== Almost one-in-three people around the world will still be mainly using polluting cooking fuels and technologies- a major source of disease and environmental destruction and devastation -- in 2030, new research warned.


==========================================================================
This rises to more than four-in-five in Sub-Saharan Africa, where the
number of people mainly using polluting fuels is growing at an alarming
rate.

A new study, carried out by UK researchers and the World Health
Organization (WHO), has estimated that just under 3 billion people
worldwide -- including more than one billion in Sub-Saharan Africa --
will still mainly be using polluting fuels such as wood fuels and charcoal
at the end of the decade.

These 'dirty' fuels are a source of major health risk as they produce
high levels of household air pollution -- chronic exposure to which
increases the risk of heart disease, pneumonia, lung cancer and strokes, amongst others.

While the overall percentage of the global population mainly using
polluting cooking fuels has been steadily decreasing since 1990, this
trend is already showing signs of stagnation. Six in in ten people in
rural areas are still reliant on biomass fuels such as wood and charcoal.

Reports by the WHO and others have attributed household air pollution
from these fuels to millions of deaths per year -- comparable to the
death toll from outdoor air pollution. At the same time, fuel collection
is often tasked to women and children, reducing opportunities for
educationor income generation Polluting fuels are also an important
cause of environmental degradation and climate change, with the black
carbon from residential biomass cooking estimate to account for 25%
of anthropogenic global black carbon emissions each year.



==========================================================================
The researchers insist the pivotal new study shows that, although progress
has been made, the quest to deliver universal access to clean cooking
by 2030 is "far off track." They believe that global leaders and policy
makers need to make significant advancements, in the short-term future, to
help combat the health and environmental risks of household air pollution.

The study is published in Nature Communications on the 4th of October
2021.

The lead author of the study, Dr Oliver Stoner, who carried out the
research at the University of Exeter but is now at the University of
Glasgow said: "Analysing global trends suggests incremental progress
in the direction of clean cooking fuels, but the simple reality is
that there can be no global success while the number of people using
polluting fuels in Sub-Saharan Africa grows by 10s of millions every
year." Heather Adair-Rohani, TechnicalLead on Health and Energy in
the Department of Environment, Climate Change and Health at the WHO headquarters in Geneva, and a senior author on the study, stressed
the importance of tackling the root causes household air pollution, "Accelerating access to clean cooking solutions must be a developmental priority. Ensuring the sustained adoption of clean cooking solutions can prevent disease and improve the livelihoods of the poorest populations
as well as protect our climate." The crucial need to provide access to
clean cooking globally was enshrined in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations member states, as one of
three targets for Sustainable Development Goal (SDG), to "ensure access
to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy."


==========================================================================
As part of its mandate to monitor and inform policy towards this goal,
WHO publishes estimates of exposure to HAP and related disease burdens,
which have traditionally examined use of polluting fuels as a group,
without distinguishing between the different fuels used.

For the new study, the researchers used sophisticated modelling combined
with increasingly detailed household survey data to give a more accurate portrayal of the extent polluting cooking fuels are still used.

The research provides comprehensive and reliable estimate for the use
of six types of fuel -- electricity, gaseous fuels, kerosene, biomass, charcoal, coal -- as well as overall clean and polluting fuel use from
1990 to 2020, and subsequent predictions up until 2030.

Together with the article, all estimates are published open access,
to enable a new wave of research and policy aimed at tackling household
air pollution.

Among the research findings are:
* The absolute number of people using polluting fuels has deviated
little
from 3 billion over the last 3 decades.

* Projections show that 2.7 billion people -- just under 1 in 3
-- will
continue to mainly rely on polluting cooking fuels in 2030.

* Sub-Saharan Africa is now the largest regional population mainly
using
polluting fuels for cooking, expected to rise above 1 billion
people in the next 5 years under a business-as-usual scenario.

Charcoal has become the most popular fuel in urban Sub-Saharan Africa.

Dr Stoner added: "While our analysis already paints a bleak
picture, we don't yet know the full extent to which the
COVID-19 pandemic has threatened or even undone recent progress." ========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by University_of_Exeter. Note: Content
may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Oliver Stoner, Jessica Lewis, Itzel Lucio Marti'nez, Sophie Gumy,
Theo
Economou, Heather Adair-Rohani. Household cooking fuel estimates at
global and country level for 1990 to 2030. Nature Communications,
2021; 12 (1) DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-26036-x ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/10/211004104149.htm

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