[Stoves] FW: South African "TLUDs" with coal ---- and a call to ACTION

[Paul S. Anderson]

John and all Stovers.

Thanks for your comments.

I would LOVE to have your coal-burning TLUD get into the market.   
Let's keep it in mind.

And, I think we could market it as "Grampa John's" stove.  Or maybe  
"Heat your home like Grampa does."

Seriously, knowing that the top-lit embuela has NOT caught on is a  
very important part of the story that was not told in the 2006  
article.  And your  reasons are correct.  And I will add:

The top-lit embuela is more of a method than a product, is freely made  
from low-value buckets, and therefore never caught on as a product for  
making a profit, and the political/financial powers cannot bridge the  
intellectual gap between better health with clean air (meaning lower  
long-term costs) and the need to put some money into having this stove  
for the townships.

In contrast, the Davies TLUD is (could be) a product from which sales  
could give the financial returns, and is a cooking stove and heater  
better than the top-lit embuela.  AND it has the health and  
environmental advantages so some entity (such as those in the Global  
Alliance for Clean Cookstoves) might actually give it some backing.

So, it might now be time for some serious "call to action" about the  
Davies TLUD for COAL!!!!  Who is interested in pursuing this??

Paul Anderson  --  Yes, but not alone.  I am working all around the  
world, and everywhere I am working with others.

John Davies    --  Maybe, depending on time and resources.  What would  
you need to bring you into this in some part-time manner?

Crispin P.P.   --  One of our few with COAL experience, but he needs  
to say if and when and how he might participate

Other Stovers  --  Please speak up.  We do not know your interest  
unless you say something.

Others who are not on this Listserv -- Including those in South Africa  
or with coal connections/interests

Agencies/entities  --  Do the GACC people and PCIA and others even  
read the Stoves Listserv?  Would everyone who sees merit in this  
budding attempt please help get the message to the right people.   ( I  
am already sending a copy of this message to one of my funding  
contacts. )

If interested, please reply either privately to me but much better if  
you reply to this Listserv AND send a copy to jss at bitmaxim.com where  
my assistant James will help get this discussion going.

Be sure your subject line says something like
     South African TLUDs with coal   or
     Davies COAL TLUD project    or
     whatever gets appropriate attention.

Paul
-- 
Paul S. Anderson, PhD
Known to some as:  Dr. TLUD    Doc    Professor
Phone (USA): 309-452-7072   SKYPE: paultlud   Email: psanders at ilstu.edu
www.gtz.de/de/dokumente/giz2011-en-micro-gasification.pdf   (Best ref.)


Quoting John Davies <jmdavies at telkomsa.net>:

>
>
> Crispin, Paul and All,
>
>
>> Dear Crispin, and to all interested in the history of TLUDs (and in
> dissemination efforts),
>
>> Thank you for finding and providing (as an attachment in his previous
> message) the informative article "Granny shows the way..." published in the
> refereed Journal of Energy in Southern Africa, May 2006, an article that was
> first submitted to the editors in August 2004.  I had never seen it before.
> Imagine what else might be out there, yet to be discovered.
>
>
> JD.  It would have been in about 2004, when Sasol did a massive PR exercise
> in promoting This method in the townships around Sasolburg and Secunda,
> where Sasol has its factories.
>
>
>> 1.  The BNM method refers to burning coal (and references to biomass are
> almost negligible), and there is minimal reference to fires of the
> size for cooking.  The South African embuela or mbuela or mbawuala
> (it has several different spellings) is a coal burner that is mainly
> used to heat houses in the cold season in the impoverished townships.
> It is responsible for massive outdoor air pollution and many deaths from CO
> poisoning indoors.
>
> JD. For those not familiar with the "embuela", this is not really a stove.
> It is a brazier, " a 20 litre tin can with holes punched in it", in which
> bituminous coal is burned. Biomass is not used, except for lighting the
> coal. It is more expensive, and has to be transported large distances. The
> coal is cheap and local.
>
>> 2.  Granny Mashinini learned of the stove when it was first introduced into
> South Africa near the town of Secunda (which is where John Davies lives), as
> reported in a 1999 publication, which I do not yet have, but it implies that
> its introduction only a few years earlier.  That does not match well with
> Crispin?s statement about it being ?quite some time ago.?  Granny M. added a
> nice touch (a couple handfuls of coal on top of the starter materials on top
> of the column of coal) to help get the fire started better.
>
> JD. As we know from history, top lighting has been around for possibly
> hundreds, or thousands of years. Being reintroduced or re discovered in
> communities around the world.
>
> I wonder if Granny M. actually discovered the concept ????   Or was the
> whole story just part of an advertising campaign.    Here we have a local
> person with a solution to massive smoke pollution, much more acceptable to
> the local people than something from an outsider.
>
>> I have no idea how far back the technique goes, but it was called
>> 'lighting it like grandma does' which gives you a hint.
>
> JD. This brings to mind the story of "Colonel Saunders, of Kentucky Fried
> Chicken", fact or Myth !
>
>> John Davies and I separately but
> at the same conferences (at least two events) presented discussions and
> conducted live-fire demonstrations in South Africa prior to the end of 2003
> (which is the last time I was in South Africa).  And John was top-igniting
> COAL in a small gasifier.  And I presented about such activities at early
> meetings of ETHOS in Seattle.  With that as the background, why do the
> References in the article have no mention of the prior work about top
> lighting for clean combustion?   This is a peer-reviewed document, so
> it is not just the author who overlooked the prior art.
>
> JD Before this time, I had been using the gasifier principle, in a miniature
> steam locomotive, and had been persuaded by Paul to try it out in a coal
> stove. The stoves list had been my main source of information for several
> years, which was used in the development of the stove. Although a coal
> burning stove has to be tuned differently, to biomass, the principle of TLUD
> applies.
>
>> 4.  The amount of information about the South African initiatives to
> disseminate the BNM method is well worth reading to help us understand
> efforts to introduce and inform about innovations with solid-fuel combustion
> devices.  They spent millions on demonstrations that reached over 15,000
> households in South Africa.  And all indications are about success.  I hope
> that someone in South Africa can up-date us on the progress to have these
> top-lit updraft coal burners adopted throughout the country.
>
> JD. I have not done any recent research. But the pollution problem has not
> improved much. In my opinion there are 2 factors involved.
>
> 1. People arriving home after a day's activities, want to achieve an embaula
> ( brazier ) with burning coke in the shortest possible time. Top lighting
> takes longer to achieve this. ( Information gathered in 2003 ) This now
> smoke free heat source, it carried into the house, ( usually a single room
> corrugated iron structure ). Where the occupants can enjoy the warmth, and
> cook over the coals.
>
> 2. Many homes are burning coal in cheap, and home made stoves, which have
> zero combustion design built in. Possibly worse than the traditional
> Mongolian stove.
>
>
> In summary, ANOTHER SUCCESS STORY for TLUDs!!!  And it is almost all in the
> 21st century.
>
> Well this depends on who you believe. The politicians, the promoters, or
> others. It can work, but we have a long way to go.
>
> Neither Sasol or the powers that be have any interest in my stove. A stove
> that was designed to do everything that the embaula does, plus the advantage
> of instant heat, use of the volatiles, currently flared off, which would
> equate to about 40% less coal consumption. And no CO in the house as it uses
> a chimney.
>
> I do not have the time or funds to promote it myself. I have put the design
> in the public domain. Maybe someone will take it and promote it.
>
> John Davies.
>
>
>
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