Energise Africa, the UK’s leading impact investment platform for clean energy access in sub-Saharan Africa, has launched the first of two £300,000 clean cooking campaign, beginning with the first bond offer for EcoSafi, a Kenyan clean-cooking venture transforming household energy across the region. The first bond offer has already attracted significant investor interest, with over 80% of its £300,000 target raised since launch.
The first of two bond offers is now open to UK retail investors, seeking to raise £300,000 with a minimum investment of just £50, a 24-month term and a target interest rate of 8% per annum. A second bond offer will follow, also raising £300,000, bringing the total Kenya fundraising to £600,000.
As global energy markets face growing volatility with geopolitical pressures pushing up fuel prices and many Kenyan households facing rising cooking costs, EcoSafi offers a more stable, affordable alternative.
EcoSafi was recently awarded Best Pitch for Clean Energy Tech at AfricArena Kenya, recognition of the strength and originality of a business model that is already delivering measurable impact at scale.
The Paris Agreement in action: how carbon credits make free stoves possible
EcoSafi’s ability to provide premium cookstoves to families at no upfront cost is not the result of donor aid or subsidy, it is the direct result of the carbon credit framework created by Article 6 of the Paris Agreement.
Article 6 of the Paris Agreement enables countries and private actors to cooperate on reducing emissions by trading verified carbon credits. When a project genuinely cuts greenhouse gas emissions, those reductions can be measured, certified and sold as credits to companies or governments internationally that need to offset their own emissions. The revenue flows back to the project, funding its expansion.
For EcoSafi, this mechanism is transformative. Every cookstove deployed displaces charcoal use, avoiding significant CO₂ emissions. Those emissions reductions are independently verified and sold as high-integrity carbon credits at premium prices — currently as high as $35 per tonne, well above the typical range for African cookstove projects. That revenue is what allows EcoSafi to hand a stove to a family in Nairobi for free.
Crucially, EcoSafi has made integrity the foundation of its carbon programme. The company is the issuer of Africa’s first carbon credits certified under Gold Standard’s rigorous Metered and Measured Energy Cooking Devices (MECD) methodology — the most exacting standard available for clean cooking projects. Rather than relying on estimates, the methodology links credit calculations directly to actual stove use and fuel sales, drawing a verifiable line from agricultural waste to a family’s kitchen.
EcoSafi holds an ‘A’ rating from independent ratings agency BeZero,the only cookstove project in the world to do so.
At a time when carbon markets have faced legitimate scrutiny for greenwashing and inflated claims, EcoSafi’s approach represents what rigorous, high-integrity carbon finance can look like in practice: a global climate agreement, made tangible in thousands of Kenyan homes.
A model built around affordability
EcoSafi provides households with a high-efficiency, zero-smoke biomass gasification stove at no or low upfront cost, then sells them sustainable fuel pellets, manufactured in Kenya from sugarcane waste, that are 40–70% cheaper than charcoal or LPG. The stove and pellets are engineered as a lock-and-key system: each is designed specifically for the other, achieving emissions so low that the stove sits in the same WHO Tier 5 category as LPG and electric cooking.
The model removes one of the biggest barriers to clean cooking in Kenya: affordability. Families benefit immediately, while the business generates revenue through pellet sales and premium carbon credits.
Funds raised through the two Kenya offers will finance the manufacture and distribution of 9,864 clean cookstoves, with EcoSafi targeting 19,720 stoves in total over the life of the project, representing a capital investment of more than £1.5 million. A future raise for expansion in Zambia is also planned.
Transforming health, time and the climate
EcoSafi’s cookstoves eliminate the toxic smoke of charcoal and wood fires, indoor air pollution that the World Health Organisation identifies as a leading cause of premature death in low-income countries. Each stove also saves families an estimated 61 hours of cooking time per year, a benefit that falls disproportionately on women.
The environmental impact is equally significant. The Kenya campaign will avoid 75,346 tonnes of CO₂ over the stoves’ lifetime, while directly reducing deforestation by cutting demand for charcoal.
“EcoSafi’s business model tackles upfront cost, fuel affordability and carbon impact all at once. The Energise Africa bond offer gives UK retail investors a direct stake in a business that is improving health, reducing deforestation and cutting carbon emissions at scale — and the carbon credit framework created by the Paris Agreement is what makes this model work. We’re proud to launch this campaign at a moment when fuel costs in Kenya are under real pressure, and we look forward to investors joining us in backing EcoSafi’s next phase of growth.”
Ray Coyle, CEO, Energise Africa“These bond offers mark a critical step in our mission to make clean cooking the norm for families across Kenya and into Zambia. Charcoal is expensive, dirty and drives deforestation. Our pellet stoves replace it entirely, at a lower cost. The Paris Agreement created the financial architecture that allows us to give stoves away for free — and the support of UK retail investors through Energise Africa gives us the capital to reach thousands more households, and to demonstrate that clean cooking can be both a viable business and a genuine force for good.”
Jordyan Woodly, CEO, EcoSafi
About the bond offers
- Kenya offer target: £600,000 over 2 raises
- Minimum investment: £50
- Term: 24 months
- Target interest rate: 8% per annum
- First offer: now open and approaching 50% funded
The first bond offer is now open to UK retail investors at www.energiseafrica.com and is eligible for tax relief through an Innovative Finance ISA, subject to individual tax position.