Killed by Breathing

The report 'Killed by Breathing' analyzes the global crisis of cooking poverty, where 3.83 billion people in 71 countries rely on solid fuels and low-quality stoves. It argues that the current 'clean cooking' sector is not on track to meet Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG7) due to fragmented governance, insufficient funding, and a lack of focus on end-user behavior. The authors propose a shift toward the term 'cooking poverty' to reflect the scale of the problem and recommend integrating cooking solutions into existing electrification infrastructure to leverage its finance and technical support systems.

• Cooking poverty is a massive public health and environmental crisis affecting 3.83 billion people across 71 countries, resulting in over four million deaths annually.
• The social and environmental cost of inaction regarding cooking poverty is estimated at $2.4 trillion per year, which is sixteen times greater than the estimated $10 billion annual cost required to achieve improved cooking for all by 2030.
• The cost of inaction is divided into three primary impacts: health ($1.4 trillion yearly), climate ($200 billion yearly), and gender ($8 billion yearly).
• Black Carbon (BC) from household cooking and heating is a major driver of climate change, with a warming impact 460-1,500 times stronger than CO2, though it is short-lived in the atmosphere.
• The report identifies a critical funding gap, noting that in 2018, alleviation of cooking poverty received only $131 million, while the cost to reach modern cooking is estimated at $150 billion yearly.
• The authors argue that the sector should rebrand from 'clean cooking' to 'cooking poverty' to better reflect the problem's scale and the need for diverse solutions, including harm reduction and incrementalism.
• A major gap in the sector is the failure to treat cooking poverty as a 'people problem,' leading to project failures when end-user motivations, cultural beliefs, and daily cooking tasks are ignored.
• The report recommends merging electrification and cooking efforts to address SDG 7.1.1 and 7.1.2 together, leveraging the electricity sector's existing infrastructure and capital.
• The authors propose the creation of a 'Playbook' to centralize siloed sector knowledge and experience, allowing new entrants to avoid past failures and scale successful initiatives.
• The report suggests a 'donor/investor/government Compact' to move away from ad-hoc fundraising and technical assistance toward a balanced approach for all phases of the transition to modern cooking.

APA

Kaluz, A.-M., Thomas, D., Hodges, J. A., Ghaffari, L., Rossano, N., Schott, P. C., & Guo, Z. (2021). Killed by Breathing. Sustainable Energy for All. https://www.seforall.org/system/files/2021-07/Killed-by-breathing-2021.pdf

Chicago

Kaluz, Anne-Marie, Deborah Thomas, John Anthony Hodges, Lisa Ghaffari, Nicholas Rossano, Peter Clarence Schott, and Zhongmin Guo. Killed by Breathing. Sustainable Energy for All, 2021. https://www.seforall.org/system/files/2021-07/Killed-by-breathing-2021.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Kaluz |first1=Anne-Marie |last2=Thomas |first2=Deborah |last3=Hodges |first3=John Anthony |last4=Ghaffari |first4=Lisa |last5=Rossano |first5=Nicholas |last6=Schott |first6=Peter Clarence |last7=Guo |first7=Zhongmin |title=Killed by Breathing |publisher=Sustainable Energy for All |date=June 2021 |url=https://www.seforall.org/system/files/2021-07/Killed-by-breathing-2021.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{kaluz2021killed, author = {Kaluz, Anne-Marie and Thomas, Deborah and Hodges, John Anthony and Ghaffari, Lisa and Rossano, Nicholas and Schott, Peter Clarence and Guo, Zhongmin}, title = {{Killed by Breathing}}, institution = {Sustainable Energy for All}, year = {2021}, month = jun, url = {https://www.seforall.org/system/files/2021-07/Killed-by-breathing-2021.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }