Air Quality

Clean Air Catalyst is a global partnership launched in 2020 by USAID to find lasting solutions to air and climate pollution that also contribute to addressing its inequitable effects in the most polluted urban regions around the world. The goals of this program are to create a practical, field-tested playbook for convening collaboration among key stakeholders, identifying and building awareness of air quality priorities, and leveraging USAID missions’ strengths to deliver and sustain cleaner air. The program covers: (i) source awareness, (ii) root cause analysis, (iii) minimal winning coalition, and (iv) building USAID capacity.

The Cleaner Air and Better Health (CABH) project is working to strengthen air pollution mitigation and reduce exposure in India by establishing evidence-based models for better air quality management. It will: 1) assess the need for regulatory reforms for improving air quality governance, 2) improve the technical understanding of sources of pollution, 3) demonstrate the feasibility and scalability of mitigation options, 4) generate hyperlocal-evidence on impact of exposure to air pollution and 5) communicate the need for behaviour change in reducing pollution. The project is being implemented by a consortium led by the Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW) and includes ASAR Social Impact Advisors (Asar), Environmental Design Solutions (EDS), Enviro Legal Defence Firm (ELDF), and Vital Strategies.

USAID Clean Air uses a multi-sectoral approach to reduce air pollution in Kathmandu Valley by engaging the government, civil society, private sector, and citizens. The activity works to improve understanding of air quality issues, find local solutions, and develop capacity and commitment to implement policies for reducing air pollution. By supporting the Government of Nepal’s operationalization of the cabinet-approved Kathmandu Valley Air Quality Management Plan, USAID Clean Air is focusing on demonstrating sustainable interventions for cleaner air that will be scaled up by municipalities through their own investment or private sector engagement.

The Alternatives to Charcoal (A2C) project works to reduce deforestation related to the production of charcoal. USAID A2C takes a market-driven approach to this challenge by catalyzing a shift in urban household cooking away from charcoal towards private sector-led, low-emissions technologies and fuels. Overall, the project expects to reduce deforestation directly attributable to charcoal production by 6.7 percent and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by more than 735,000 metric tons.

The Reducing Pollution Activity aims to address Vietnam’s environmental pollution challenges through support to local actors with a focus on plastic waste, wastewater from urban households and craft villages, and air pollution. Two local backbone organizations will be awarded to work on air pollution interventions for two major causes: open-burning and transportation. The craft villages interventions will also include air pollution as part of the program.

The MCHF activity is designed to promote sustainable forest management in Malawi in select landscapes, support sustainable cooking energy options in select urban demand centers, maintain forest cover, and to reduce land-based emissions. By increasing demand for alternative cooking energy options and fuel-efficient cooking technologies and increasing the supply of sustainable wood fuels from well-managed forest resources, MCHF will help Malawi reduce unsustainable tree cutting in both public and customary forests, improve forest cover, and conserve associated watersheds. MCHF promites a wide range of cooking energies and technologies including LPG, biogass, pellets/gasifier stoves, improved charcoal and firewood stoves, electric cooking and ethanol.

BURN Manufacturing is one of the most successful manufacturers of high-efficiency cookstoves, having already manufactured and sold over two million stoves in East Africa. With DIV support, BURN will accelerate its impact by expanding production and sales to Ghana and Nigeria. With this expansion, BURN is expected to produce and distribute over one million stoves in West Africa, reach six million people, generate substantial household savings on fuel, and reduce pollution and pressure on deforestation. BURN is also now pivoting to offering the first Pay As You Cook electric induction cook stove in Africa.