Safe, Eco-friendly Winter Heating for 2738 Vulnerable IDP Households Living in Camps and Informal Settlements in Sanjar Sub-District, Idlib. Six years of devastating armed conflict, the breakdown of civic infrastructure and traditional commercial channels in N. Syria has left Syrians unable to procure the necessary fuel needed to heat their homes during winter months. Internally displaced people are living day to day in self-settled tented encampments and collective shelters without reliable access to basic commodities and services. Vulnerable segments of society including IDP’s, single women, female headed households, children, the elderly and disabled individuals are significantly more likely to encounter difficulties procuring enough fuel for themselves and their families during the winter months. Furthermore, lack of adequate fuel makes it difficult to heat food and boil water, which is a basic form of water purification. 

Traditionally, central heating, or electric heat has not been used in northern Syria, instead coal or wood was burned. Now as the conflict deepens and resources like wood and coal are non-existent, Syrian families are resorting to the most inefficient, dangerous, and unsustainable methods to survive the winter. Burning diesel, kerosene, and LPG (propane), often utilized in primus stoves, are dangerous, especially in tents and improvised shelters. In April 2013, MSF reported an increase of major burns during winter months early in the conflict from domestic accidents involving stoves and highly flammable fuel. Mercy-USA can confirm that beneficiaries in Aleppo City complained of the same, especially among children, as the stoves in use were unstable and liable to explode if the incorrect fuel mixture was used.

Even worse, six years into the Syrian Crisis, many vulnerable families are resorting to burning toxic materials such as plastic, car tires or other dangerous combustibles increasing the risk of respiratory complications, especially for children and the elderly. Vulnerable populations have been forced to barter or sell assets in order to secure enough fuel for the winter months. On a deeper level, many of the fuel sources used inside Syria are associated with conflict areas and subject to exorbitant and unpredictable inflation due to the costs and lack of access associated with shifting conflict lines, smuggling and doing business with armed groups.

This project aims to provide those most in need with a better alternative during this period of horrific insecurity. A largely untapped resource, olive-pit biomass fuel (colloquially referred to as Prina) is a non-volatile solid fuel that comes in the form of pressed briquettes or small pellets. The fuel is eco-friendly, available locally in Idlib Governorate, and conflict-free. It can be burned in wood stoves as well as stoves designed for coal, providing a high temperature adequate for heating a home, cooking and boiling water. Produced from the waste product of olive oil production, olive-pit biomass fuel has costs similar to more dangerous alternatives. The stoves themselves include all the necessary pipes to properly exhaust smoke from a variety of dwellings, and they are heavy enough not to tip or easily be pulled down by a child.