The Campaign

At times abundance leads to wastage and by the time one realizes this, it might lead to scarcity. This is also true for majority households in this country who gets the benefit of cooking gas 24/7. Consumers of these households have the habit of not turning off the gas stove once its work is done, causing unnecessary wastage of country’s natural resource. The intention was to create an exciting experience among the households regarding gas wastage without making them feel guilty. So, the insight taken was - people won’t stop wasting unless they don’t get the chance to waste at all. So, the solution can modify both existing and new stoves with a touch of innovation. The intention was to enhance the ability of a gas stove and give the gas burner an arm to become a gas saver as well.

Creative Execution

RFL Gas Saving Burner, a stove that burns gas and saves it as well! This stove uses a very simple and cost effective mechanism, pressure lever, found everywhere in the local market. A pressure lever is adjusted to the gas pipe and activates the stove fire upon getting the pressure from the cooking utensil. Upon removal of the cooking utensil, the lever stops the gas flow. RFL has created the prototype that has worked without any error and is ready for commercial production and usage. The pressure lever can be implemented in existing stoves or if required one can purchase a new ‘RFL Gas Saving Burner’.

Indication of how successful the outcome was in the market

RFL Gas Saving Burner is now at pre-production phase and the innovation has immense potential to save the indigenous resource once it hits the market commercially. There are around 850,000 fixed gas connections in the household sector*. According to a hypothesis, a single household uses approximately 9 cubic feet gas in an hour. Now that if the mechanism saves gas even for an hour in these 850,000 houses each day, imagine the volume it can save in just a month, let alone a year or the years yet to come. * Report by Titas Gas, 2017 (https://www.titasgas.org.bd)

Domestic gas wastage is an on-going topic in Bangladesh. Various awareness campaign has been implemented, but none could see the light of the day. When an internal dip stick was conducted, it came out that people are aware of the wastage, but were not too eager to take any action. As natural gas is not a scarce commodity, so people didn’t bother to minimize wastage. So, the insight taken was - people won’t stop wasting unless they don’t get the chance to waste at all. So, the strategy was to modify both existing and new stoves with a touch of innovation. The strategy was to enhance the ability of a gas stove and give the gas burner an arm to become a gas saver as well.