In many parts of the world, a picture of a woman sitting in front of a smoky cookstove preparing a family meal remains an iconic picture of life today. For many families, the three- stone fire or a traditional stove as a cooking device has not changed over centuries. This need not be the case, and in a growing number of nations, that traditional pattern is changing.

Serious research on improved cookstoves dates back to the 1950s. However, large-scale field programs focused largely on the inefficiency of designs. While the stoves may appear simple, the socio-cultural systems in which they operate, and their impacts on so many aspects of household and regional health and economics, is far from simple. Many approaches have been tried, with some successes and many failures.

Over the last few years, a more complete view of the full human and environmental health impacts of indoor air pollution and the global impact of the fuel and stove cycle has emerged. Poorly managed fuel systems encourage use of unsustainably harvested fuel such as charcoal produced from illegal and ecologically damaging informal production network.

In Africa, where two-thirds of farmers are women, the potential of biofuels as a low or lower-carbon alternative fuel, with applications at the household energy, community and village level, to a national resource or export commodity, has a critical gender dimension. The key question is: how will increased biofuel production affect women?

To look at the impacts on women, one logical approach is to use a computable general equilibrium model that tracks economic impacts of new crops and how patterns of trade and substitution will change. It’s important to account for the complexities involved, and rely not on a simple, traditional commodity model but one that tracks the impacts on women through changing prices and demands for crops to be sold on local and international markets. Who gains and who loses as prices change, and as the value of specific crops and of land changes?

Dan Kammen spoke at the "National Summit on Advancing Clean Energy Technologies" held in Washington, DC on May 16th/17th on issues pertaining to the Smart Grid. The summit organizers include the Howard Baker Forum, the Bipartisan Policy Center and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

"[...] There were plenty of ideas on how to improve the process of producing and distributing energy — and plenty of counterbalancing viewpoints on the hurdles involved. Moderator David Owen of The New Yorker solicited thoughts from Rogers, Russ Ford of Shell, Dan Kammen of the World Bank and Sen. Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico.

Probably the most re-Tweeted comment during this discussion was Kammen’s observation that “We have not seen the ‘go to the moon’ speech yet on clean energy.” Part of his point was that, both governmentally and culturally, we do not yet have an overarching, systems-oriented view of energy problems. For example, Kammen noted, there are policies that focus on energy generation, but not transmission; there are clean cookstove initiatives that never concern themselves with how the wood for those stoves can be sustainably sourced. What’s needed is a holistic approach to such problems."

In a planet running out of resources, the most important public policy tool may be the measuring stick.

This becomes important to remember amid the remarkable swings of pessimism and guarded optimism we’ve seen over the past two years on the ability of individual nations to scale-up the sustainable energy agenda.

COP15 in Copenhagen 2009 was a step backwards, while COP16 in Cancun in December 2010 was a guarded step forward.   On the positive side at the national level, the United Kingdom has made a very significant step by establishing a floor price and an escalation schedule for the price of carbon emissions, while Mexico and Brazil have launched ambitious energy efficiency and clean energy development plans.  At the sub-national level, China is launching experimental regional carbon cap-and-trade schemes.

By popular vote, during a very down economy California upheld by a wide margin a historic greenhouse gas reduction plan (AB32, the Pavley-Nuñez Bill) in the 2011 general elections.  Moving forward on January 1, 2012, California will take a major step and  launch a carbon market. I worked on AB32 as it was being written, and more recently, as part of the committee that advised the state on the market rules to govern the carbon exchange.