Our Story
Since 2008, field work, engineering, partnership, mistakes, and learning have shaped our work in southern Mexico.
The organization began as Water for Humans and evolved into Planet Wise Solutions as the cookstove program became its strongest and most scalable intervention.
Water for Humans was founded in Seattle as a U.S. 501(c)(3), initially focused on practical water and sanitation solutions for underserved communities.
WFH worked in Oaxaca with INSO — Instituto de la Naturaleza y la Sociedad de Oaxaca — on water and sanitation projects, including rainwater harvesting and water-treatment work. These early projects taught a lasting lesson: engineering alone does not determine whether a solution succeeds.
Local relationships, governance, trust, language, history, and daily practice shape what is actually possible. That lesson became the foundation for the cookstove program.
In 2012, Water for Humans joined The Hunger Project–Mexico for a site visit to the Sierra Mazateca in northeastern Oaxaca. The cooking conditions made the need for a cleaner, more efficient stove impossible to miss.
In 2013, Water for Humans and The Hunger Project–Mexico returned for a broader pilot that included rainwater catchment, composting latrines, and two experimental cookstoves.
The stove pilot really was an experiment. We did not yet know whether the technology would perform in everyday cooking, whether families would accept it, or whether they would still choose to use it months and years later.
The response was immediate. The day after the stoves were commissioned, roughly 100 women crowded into one kitchen saying, in effect, “We want one — and we want it now.” We looked at our partners and realized we had opened a much bigger door than we expected.
In one early build, Rick helped construct a stove on an empty concrete slab before the walls even existed. The women explained that they were going to build the new kitchen around it. That kind of household investment became an early sign that the stove was changing more than the fire.
The cookstove program became both an engineering process and an education process. With partners and community members, we learned to listen closely, incorporate ideas, address concerns, test changes in real cooking conditions, and revise the design again.
Local Knowledge Is Infrastructure. Understand before you engineer.
In 2014, WFH and THP-Mexico launched Gen 1 training with 10 Promoters organized into 5 teams. Gen 1 training and builds continued through 2017, with the great majority of stoves built in the Sierra Mazateca and additional stoves later built in Chiapas.
Height, layout, cooking surfaces, and operating details were shaped through direct feedback from the women who would use them. The first Promoters building Gen 1 stoves in Oaxaca’s Mazateca mountains gave the stove its name: La Mazateca. PWS reports that more than 90% of the Gen 1 stoves remain in operation, supported in part by local maintenance and Promoters who can identify field problems and work with PWS technical staff on case-by-case solutions.
WFH and THP-Mexico introduced Gen 2.0 in Chiapas in 2018. Training and implementation produced 25 Gen 2.0 stoves. Field use later exposed a weakness in the wood support frame — exactly the kind of problem that only long-term use can reveal.
PATENT PENDINGWFH had identified the Gen 2.0 wood-support-frame problem and developed a complete repair plan. Lockdowns and uncertainty prevented a coordinated field repair campaign, so owners and Promoters adapted — drawing on the repair approach where possible and on their own knowledge and resourcefulness. Many stoves received improvised repairs, and more than 90% of the Gen 2.0 fleet remains in operation today.
At the same time, tourism disappeared from San Cristóbal de las Casas, taking with it the textile income many women in partner communities depended on. WFH purchased the cooperative’s inventory and facilitated sales through U.S. supporters, creating an alternative source of income while normal markets were closed.
In 2024, Margarita Ruiz López led Gen 2.2 training and implementation in Chiapas. Gen 2.2 permanently removed the Gen 2.0 wood support frame and incorporated the redesigned construction process. Implementation continued into 2025 as all 33 Gen 2.2/2.2X stoves were completed.
PATENT PENDINGAcross 2025–2026, Water for Humans rebranded as Planet Wise Solutions and refocused its mission around the cookstove program.
The next question is whether the model can scale without losing the local ownership that made it work.
