[Stoves] Clarifications Re: Off-topic again: Ron fails to define service standard and goals for "better biomass stoves"
Paul Anderson
psanders at ilstu.edu
Sat Dec 17 15:09:18 CST 2016
Ron and Nikhil and Crispin and others,
I admit that (with a few lapses) I read these "exchanges". And I learn
some things. They ARE "on-topic" about stoves for impoverished people
(and I intentionally did not limit that to biomass-fuel stoves because
we need to understand alternatives and "oppositions").
I do note that not a single person sent any message about my summary of
the LPG-stoves webinar. I thought that the data about subsidies etc and
not reaching the truly impoverished in sustainable ways would get some
reaction. No problem. That topic is over.
I comment about two short segments from recent messages:
1. Referring to efforts to slow or reverse "climate change" / CO2
increase, there was a comment about
> saving mama earth while her children die.
Saddly, it is possible that both the earth and her children "die" (or
suffer undesireable consequences) because not enough is being done for
either.
We should be trying to save BOTH. That could be with separate
efforts for each (such as solar panels and planting trees for the earth,
whicl digging water wells and having water filters for the people
(children of earth). But BETTER if one effort helps both goals at the
same time. And that is the beauty of cookstove efforts, ESPECIALLY
those that can be carbon negative while doing the cooking tasks with
less biomass fuel.
That happens to be the case of the TLUD stoves. But there is
pathetically little support for TLUD stoves from either the earth-savers
or the children-savers.
2. I think these were Nikhil's words:
> The only connection I see between stoves and CO2 is that technologies
> that increase kg CO2 output per kg input of carbonaceous fuel are a
> boon to people as well as climate.
I do not understand what "increase kg CO2 output per kg input of
[biomass] fuel" means, or how it is a boon.
Paul
Doc / Dr TLUD / Prof. Paul S. Anderson, PhD
Email: psanders at ilstu.edu
Skype: paultlud Phone: +1-309-452-7072
Website: www.drtlud.com
On 12/17/2016 1:29 AM, Ronal W. Larson wrote:
> List, Nikhil, and ccs:
>
> It is way past my usual bedtime, so just two comments.
>
> a) I believe this to definitely be “on topic”, so think it deserves
> to go to the whole list - as Nikhil seems to approve of my doing.
>
> b) Nikhil accuses me of calling him a “denier”. I carefully and
> intentionally did not do so. But observe his response near the end:
> “/The only connection I see between stoves and CO2 is that
> technologies that increase kg CO2 output per kg input of carbonaceous
> fuel are a boon to people as well as climate.”/
> Anybody else think that sounds like a denier talking?
>
> Ron
>
>> On Dec 17, 2016, at 12:05 AM, Traveller <miata98 at gmail.com
>> <mailto:miata98 at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>
>> Dear Ron: (Hi, Ajay. Please don't take anything personally. Ron seems
>> to like red herrings and fears heresy.)
>>
>> I owe you a reply on my past 28 sins but let's keep that cooking on
>> the back burner or the fire goes out. I will respond to your 9
>> comments here.
>>
>> You know I can't stop reporting 'offtopic' items relevant to fuel,
>> smoke. CDC, EPA will keep on producing material worth .
>>
>> There is really no point putting all this on the list. You seem to
>> have no answers and to be interested only in questioning my
>> "authority" (which I don't care to possess in the first place) and
>> calling me a "climate denier".
>>
>> Sad. Sad.
>>
>> I will still respond to your comments on my 28 sins, on list, and you
>> may put all this below on to the List; I don't think it deserves that
>> place.
>>
>>
>>
>> -----------
>> ND on RWL 1: GACC is a brand. I don't know who believed in it and
>> why. I will expand when I get a contract. Maybe a Global Alliance on
>> Livable Human Environments (GALHE), maybe a Global Alliance Against
>> House Chores (GAAHC).
>>
>> ND on RWL 2: I will be happy to have you on board, so long as I am
>> the chairman of the board. I am going to request a trip to the White
>> House Kitchen as well as the kitchens at the Pentagon, Walter Reed,
>> Army Navy Country Club, Camp David. Soldiers, health professionals,
>> restaurateurs, and monks/nuns have a good idea of what cooking is;
>> many of them have a better knowledge of the world than the poverty
>> tourists in academia and media. I will contract the Congressional
>> Research Service to produce Country/Regional Handbooks on Cooking and
>> Heating.
>>
>> ND on RWL 3: Permit me to ask:
>>
>> a) What is the definition of biomass and why is it
>> appropriate to the specific context?
>> b) I can understand why technical characteristics of stoves
>> using other solids or gases or electricity be excluded from
>> the discussion - e.g., the effect of power outages on laundry
>> deliveries in five-star hotels - but what is the rationale
>> for not discussing the markets for cooking with such
>> different fuels?
>> c) In other words, do you have a definition of a "service
>> standard" and "market" for cooking? Why not?
>> d) Generally, what is biomass worth other than the price it
>> fetches or the cost of producing it?
>>
>> e) Has anybody measured biomass balances at local, regional,
>> national levels or by agro-climatic zones to understand
>> variations over time?
>>
>> ND on RWL 4: I conclude that your sole interest is to discuss what
>> you feel like. I just sent you my 14 October 2016 draft reply to you
>> on coal. By my count, Colorado alone produced nearly 1.5 billion tons
>> of coal in 150+ years. (Colorado Coal: energy security for the future
>> <http://coloradogeologicalsurvey.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/rtv8n21.pdf>,
>> 2005 plus EIA data since.) Please first expiate your dark coal sins
>> before preaching chastity to others.
>>
>> ND on RWL 5: I remember there was a Bioenergy list - not this one on
>> Stoves - that discussed fuel chemistry and combustion chemistry. I
>> see that the ISO IWA says nothing about fuel chemistry. If you and
>> others on this list are interested in fuel chemistry, I am interested
>> in an inventory of fuels and emissions organized along fuel chemistry
>> lines. I can go to coal industry and find a good history of coal
>> analysis around the world. I have yet to see a single biomass fuel
>> chemistry record for any country. Please get on with the work instead
>> of ranting against coal. What do biomass stovers know about biomass
>> stocks and flows, value chains and opportunity costs?
>>
>> ND on RWL 6: It is because the "results" and credibility mania have
>> wasted time and money that I want to raise GACC and other funds to do
>> something useful. Peanuts attract peanut eaters.
>>
>> ND on RWL 7: I am done with your cite-o-logy. Please provide
>> propositions with which one can agree or disagree. What is your
>> theory about ANYTHING relevant to cooking in the developing
>> countries? Or do you want to just refer to the pronouncements of GACC
>> CEO? As far as I am concerned, Kirk Smith said it all (with Karabi
>> Dutta) in "In Praise of Petroleum" (Science 2007?) "Cooking Like Gas"
>> (ESD 2012?), and Power to the People (Science 2014?). Why do you just
>> keep dropping his name?
>>
>> As for Figure 5.6 from Ajay's PhD thesis, I don't think it's
>> cost-effective for me to dissect the data and methods for Guatemala
>> HAPIt. Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn. My post on
>> "super-human" GoBbleDygook explained my reasons for unhappiness. I
>> might get around to posting unhappiness with DALYs and all that ritzy
>> dance; it's just not worth it. The underlying data quality of global
>> DALYs is pathetic. And averted DALYs for different cohorts is
>> intellectual smoke. Products of Incomplete Combustion. Gold is tested
>> at high temperature, not by smoke.
>>
>> Oh, by the way, "Gold Standard" peer review typifies virtually
>> everything that is wrong with the Academic-Activist-Deceit complex.
>> Sell it to Al Gore.
>>
>> $1,500 per averted DALY? Why don't we shut down all hospitals and let
>> people buy averted DALYs?
>>
>> The whole paradigm of monetizing DALYs is a sickness. (Ajay: When you
>> are in Washington next, let's get together for a beer. Your and
>> Kirk's work is being abused to n-th degree.)
>>
>> ND on RWL 8: Nothing is clean to me about "clean". Above all, the
>> ISO IWA exercise on Tiering - from what I can judge from GACC and ISO
>> websites - and the WHO/EPA/BAMG is "context free", "fact free".
>> Boiling Water for some standardized cooks with standardized bodies --
>> yeah, right. I don't find a "service standard" or "objectives and
>> goals" for "clean" on GACC website.
>>
>> All I see is YOUR goals
>>
>> - "protect forests?? How many, where, and when?
>>
>> - "reducing the cost of cooking"? Which cost? By how much? Where
>> and when?
>>
>> - "required CDR"? By whom? Why?
>>
>>
>> All I see is another round of tinkering. Not worth more than a few
>> million dollars to buy peace. No finance minister is willing to put
>> down his $1,500,000,000,000 to buy a billion averted DALYs.
>>
>> A "clean" cookstoves has no meaning whatsoever. it's a propaganda
>> term to snow people and shake down money. The Clintons did it one
>> way, the Trumps another. Either give me the definition and means of
>> measurement, and explain why it is relevance to human health.
>>
>> Please explain to me why you feel "*excess atmospheric CO2 seems to
>> me to be the absolute worst pollutant - with huge health
>> implications.*" The poor suffer the climate whether or not it is
>> changing, whether or not the change is anthropogenic, and whether or
>> not the Colorado no-Carbo Cult reduces a few nanograms of coal CO2
>> emissions per breath.
>>
>> I have absolutely no patience with being labelled a "climate denier".
>> The term is coined by enviro-Nazis, people who would spend their time
>> modeling and babbling, saving mama earth while her children die.
>>
>> Oh, well. Go ahead. Call me names. Unless you can do better.
>>
>> ND on RWL 9: Please educate yourself on chemistry. Beginning with
>> coal chemistry. Or acid rain chemistry. Or the air chemistry of your
>> town, city or air basin. Then the biochemistry of human body. We'll
>> talk about atmospheric chemistry later.
>>
>> I for one am hoping that US government comes up with keeping the
>> Black Lung Fund afloat. Putting a carbon tax in Colorado to fund it
>> will make you happy and bring coal consumption in Colorado to zero.
>>
>> Coal use worldwide has been increasing - according to EIA, from
>> around 150 quads in 2010 to around 160 quads now, going up to some
>> 180 quads in 2040.
>>
>> The news of coal's demise is premature.
>>
>> The only connection I see between stoves and CO2 is that technologies
>> that increase kg CO2 output per kg input of carbonaceous fuel are a
>> boon to people as well as climate.
>>
>> Please go back and read Kirk Smith. For God's sake if not mine.
>>
>> Nikhil
>>
>> ---------
>> //
>>
>> On Fri, Dec 16, 2016 at 8:02 PM, Ronal W. Larson
>> <rongretlarson at comcast.net <mailto:rongretlarson at comcast.net>> wrote:
>>
>> Nikhil and ccs (adding Ajay as a courtesy)
>>
>> Glad to see “on-topic” Can we assume no more “off-topic” from you?
>>
>> See below.
>>
>>> On Dec 16, 2016, at 3:26 PM, Traveller <miata98 at gmail.com
>>> <mailto:miata98 at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Ron:
>>>
>>> I am serious about raising a billion dollars for GACC. Including
>>> for biomass stoves.
>> *[RWL1: I find this a little hard to believe. Please expand;
>> some examples from your past writings to show you believe in GACC?*
>>>
>>> Sad to see that you are not. The Alliance needs new partners
>>> like Ivanka. GACC needs to continue with Leo DeCaprio and Jose
>>> Andres if that is what it takes to raise money. There’s no hope
>>> for engineers without more money, I am sure you will agree
>>> (because that is what I have seen argue a lot for - more money.)
>> *[RWL2: I am for the $1 billion number; can you explain why
>> you think I am not?*
>>> So far I thought the purpose of this List was to discuss ways of
>>> producing - and successfully marketing (I imagine) BETTER
>>> BIOMASS STOVES. You now want to restrict only to WOOD-FIRED
>>> COOKSTOVES?
>> *[RWL3: Apologies. I erred. I should have said biomass-fired
>> stoves - as in the existing rules for this list.*
>>> I submit to you that you cannot move an inch toward better
>>> biomass stoves without also looking at the competition (coal
>>> included) and defining your terms - biomass and cookstoves.
>> *[RWL4: I disagree that we need to discuss coal-fired stoves at
>> all. My hope is to phase them out. We have limited bandwidth
>> -and folks wanting to discuss improving coal stoves have plenty
>> of opportunity to start a list for that. I probably would join
>> that list. I hope you are not suggesting that coal is a form of
>> biomass.*
>>> With enough data characterizing fuel chemistry around the world,
>>> moisture variability throughout seasons, foods that are being
>>> cooked with the cookstoves.
>> *[RWL5: Not sure of the point here. Are you suggesting this
>> list is not interested in these topics? *
>>> Far too much money and time has been wasted on measuring and
>>> debating the impacts of “improved stoves" projects.
>> *[RWL6: It is clear that this is your long-held belief
>> (and conflicts with your support in #1 for GACC funding
>> increases). One example of your view of waste seems to have been
>> (all?) of the work of Kirk Smith? A few days ago you referenced
>> a PhD thesis by Ajay Pillarisetti. I found it very informative
>> and with to recommend it to this list. See
>> ***http://escholarship.org/uc/item/7hw5z2w2
>> <http://escholarship.org/uc/item/7hw5z2w2> .
>>
>> *I would be interested in what part of this thesis you include in
>> the term “too much money and time”?*
>>> I submit there is not an iota of gain from IHME/WHO GoBbleDygook.
>> *[RWL7: It is my strong opinion that you are in a very small
>> minority on this view. It would help your case a lot if you gave
>> a few cites who agree with you. I find many dozens of cites in
>> Ajay’s thesis**in support of what he has done - and which you
>> have otherwise deplored. Here is a key figure (#5.6) from that
>> thesis that I find very well argued and find convincing. *
>> *
>> *
>> <PastedGraphic-1.tiff>
>> *
>> *
>> *(It opens larger for me, hope so for others). It is his Fig
>> 5.6a, with of course much more detail available there. This
>> figure says that about $1500 (for added chimneys) will avert one
>> DALY - and that this action would be highly cost effective. How
>> would you or anyone argue to not use this information? I am
>> hoping for specifics - not generalities.*
>>
>> *I have included Ajay mostly to congratulate him (and his thesis
>> team) for a very fine thesis - but also, as a courtesy, to give
>> him background as we await Nikhil’s further comments on Ajay’s
>> modeling effort. For those not aware of Nikhil’s style -
>> GoBbleDygook is his disparaging term for the huge amount of work
>> behind the study called GBD - Global Burden of Disease. I look
>> forward to learning (from Nikhil) of others who agree with him.*
>>
>> *It appears to me that Nikhil has simply not understood Ajay’s
>> modeling - as Nikhil has given no details on his unhappiness.
>> This would be a good time to provide details - since it seems
>> likely that GACC and many others (still awaiting $1 billion) are
>> quite apt to be using this.*
>>
>> *I am told that the “Gold Standard” certification group will soon
>> be approving use of this methodology. That takes considerable
>> peer review.*
>>> Please define the service standard and the environmental
>>> objectives and goals of "clean cookstoves" movement.
>> *[RWL8: I refer you to the GACC website. I don’t see much
>> difference there with what we wrote 20 years ago for this list.
>> What is there about the word “clean” that is unclear?*
>> *
>> *
>> *To help Nikhil as he asks for my own definition, I should
>> perhaps repeat my history with this stoves topic. After
>> retiring, I developed a rudimentary version of what is now called
>> a TLUD over several years - working in Sweden, Ethiopia, and
>> showed once to friends in Sudan (which country started my search
>> because it has been so badly harmed by a huge dependence on
>> charcoal). In 1995, I described this charcoal-making stove on a
>> predecessor list also run by Tom Miles and after a few months,
>> Tom asked me to be one of the first two coordinators of an early
>> version of this list (those records have been lost). In this
>> first phase of my experience with stoves (well after Kirk Smith
>> and many others), I was motivated only by saving forests
>> - because charcoal production is usually so badly handled (as we
>> have been hearing over the last few days). In my mind this fits
>> the word “clean”. This proposed new type of stove was a vehicle
>> for making charcoal in a superior manner,*
>>
>> *As I became more aware of stove work by others, I learned that
>> a TLUD is (by chance?) the cleanest form of stove. To further
>> protect forests, it is natural to talk about stoves and
>> health/disease (GBD). I emphasize they are additive reasons, not
>> alternative.*
>>
>> *As I talked about this with others, and watched the way a stove
>> is tested (esters never leaving the open door), I added time
>> savings for the cook as a reason to support TLUDs. I consider
>> this part also of the word “clean” because real world cooks don’t
>> operate like (the very talented) stove testers.*
>>
>> *Then came a time when it became apparent that TLUDs had a great
>> shot at greatly reducing the cost of cooking, as there is a huge
>> global market for charcoal. Not because of cleanliness and health
>> - but those desirable goals are promoted when someone sees better
>> economics in TLUDs than rockets (despite the TLUD’s drawback of
>> batch operation).*
>>
>> *But in about 2005 (ten years from the beginning), with most of
>> my time then being on RE and EE topics (and not on stoves), I
>> learned about terra preta. A charcoal-making stove fit very
>> nicely with the fabulous news of both greatly improved soils and
>> the possibility of biochar (so named two years later) helping
>> with carbon dioxide removal (CDR). Climate deniers can’t see the
>> connection, it appears, but excess atmospheric CO2 seems to me to
>> be the absolute worst pollutant - with huge health implications.
>> I see the household cookstove market as being able to eventually
>> supply about 10% of the CDR needed. But it can be the first -
>> because this form of CDR is so cost effective. And it can take
>> place where (tropical regions) we can expect responses like terra
>> preta to occur again (practiced for thousands of years with zero
>> thoughts of CDR). This atmospheric side also in my mind falls
>> under the category of “clean”. Unfortunately, this is opaque
>> to climate deniers as they don’t agree that we have any serious
>> excess CO2 problem.*
>>
>> *So I go again through this litany to explain why I am supportive
>> of anyone looking at stoves as in Ajay’s thesis. None of these
>> are either/or arguments. It just happens that I am responding at
>> this length because I want work like Ajay’s to continue - as cost
>> numbers such as in his Figure 5.6 are certainly going to be able
>> to add to the other economic values I am claiming
>> for forest preservation, time savings, added income, and global
>> warming.*
>>
>> *Apologies for a too long-winded answer on my “goals” for “clean
>> cookstoves”. I add this to explain why I am so opposed to this
>> list promoting coal stoves in any fashion (added to the fact that
>> WHO recommends against the use of untreated (the usual) coal for
>> stoves.*
>>> It’s all in fuel chemistry, air chemistry and atmospheric
>>> chemistry.
>> *[RWL9: Can I assume this emphasis on chemistry means that you
>> agree with a global goal of getting back quickly to a CO2
>> atmospheric level of 300 ppm or so? Your recent support of coal
>> seems to deny a problem with 2 degree C rise. As a chemist,
>> where are you on the urgency of doing something with global
>> warming? And do you see any connection with global warming and
>> this stoves list?*
>> *If it is not yet clear where I stand on coal - its demise is
>> decades overdue.*
>> *
>> *
>> *Ron (with a EE degree - that I am not using in any of the above)
>> *
>>>
>>> Nikhil (with a chemistry degree)
>>>
>>>
>>> On Fri, Dec 16, 2016 at 2:25 PM, Ronal W. Larson
>>> <rongretlarson at comcast.net <mailto:rongretlarson at comcast.net>>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Nikhil: cc list
>>>
>>> Can I suggest that you place additional “off-topic”
>>> messages on some other list? (I feel I just wasted a
>>> half-hour.)
>>>
>>> The answer to your last question would seem to be one of
>>> those you seem to most admire - the Trumps.
>>>
>>> Or what did I miss of importance to improving wood-fired
>>> cookstoves - the goal of this list?
>>>
>>> Ron
>>>
>>>
>>>> On Dec 16, 2016, at 9:15 AM, Traveller <miata98 at gmail.com
>>>> <mailto:miata98 at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Around town, there are rumors that Ivanka Trump, Donald's
>>>> daughter, could be more significant than Hillary Clinton.
>>>> (The election is on World Toilet Day according to Crispin.)
>>>>
>>>> Ivanka Trump could be the most powerful first lady ever
>>>> <https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/12/16/ivanka-trump-could-be-the-most-powerful-first-lady-ever>,
>>>> Washington Post 16Dec16.
>>>>
>>>> Ivanka loves cooking
>>>> <http://celebritybabies.people.com/2016/07/21/ivanka-trump-raising-three-children-jared-kushner-exhausted/>,
>>>> has put recipes
>>>> <http://www.ivankatrump.com/recipes-broccoli-kugel-steamed-artichokes-chicken-salad-veal-marsala/>
>>>> on her website, and says about her book Women Who Work
>>>> <http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/women-who-work-ivanka-trump/1123884764?ean=9780735211322&st=PLA&sid=BNB_DRS_Core+Shopping+Books_00000000&2>,
>>>> "We learn how to cook and how to code. We inspire our
>>>> employees and our children. We innovate at our current jobs
>>>> and start new businesses."
>>>>
>>>> She and Chelsea are friends
>>>> <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/you/article-3834181/First-daughters-fast-friends-unlikely-bond-Chelsea-Clinton-Ivanka-Trump.html>,
>>>> so I am sure Hillary would just adopt Ivanka as the second
>>>> daughter she didn't have.
>>>>
>>>> Above all, she arranged a meeting between The Donald and Al
>>>> Gore, who could decide which way theEarth in the Balance
>>>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_in_the_Balance> tips.
>>>>
>>>> South Lawn dinners with the Clintons and the Trumps is the
>>>> way to go for UN Foundation, Inc. and Bill Hillary and
>>>> Chelsea Clinton Foundation, Inc. I can devise a $1
>>>> billion fund raising strategy just for high class marketing
>>>> - Narendra Modi, Vladimir Putin, Dr. Kim and all, PLUS a
>>>> $10 billion investment fund for "clean cookstoves".
>>>>
>>>> Yup. The time has come. To elevate GACC to the next level.
>>>>
>>>> The White House kitchen
>>>> <http://content.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1877168,00.html>
>>>> wasn't always clean
>>>> <https://www.thrillist.com/eat/nation/white-house-food-presidential-eating>.
>>>> Maybe the next brand for GACC will be Global Alliance for
>>>> Clean Kitchens and Homes.
>>>>
>>>> Now, where's my "finder's fee" for an even more glamorous
>>>> Cooking Ambassador?
>>>>
>>>> Nikhil
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> ---------
>>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
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