Every morning, Mary Kavutha cooks breakfast for her two children on an electric cooker in her home in Nairobi, Kenya. In 2024, she relied on a charcoal cookstove that filled her kitchen with smoke and cost about $1.15 a day in fuel. Now, she notes, 80 cents of electricity cooks several meals. "It cooks much faster, and is much safer because I have young children," Kavutha said.

Nearly 1 billion Africans still cook with charcoal or firewood. Kavutha switched not out of climate concerns but because clean stoves have become affordable. Their low price comes from carbon credit financing, which lets companies raise money against future income from cutting emissions. Investors cover much of the initial cost and receive income from carbon credits generated as households burn less charcoal and wood.

"Our biggest innovation is not the stove itself, but the financing behind it," said Peter Scott, who founded BURN, a company that makes clean cookstoves. With carbon subsidies, an efficient stove that normally sells for about $40 can cost as little as $5. BURN says it has distributed over 7.3 million cookstoves in 11 African countries.

Still, critics warn that relying too heavily on carbon credits is risky. In February 2026, the Kenyan firm Koko Networks closed after failing to win government approval to sell credits. Carbon money can help but should not be the foundation of the transition, argued George Mwaniki, an air quality expert.

For Kavutha, the result is simple. "My kitchen is cleaner, my children are safer, and I spend less," she said.