[Stoves] Two typos

Wed Apr 26 21:32:44 CDT 2017

1. In para 8 of post 1 below beginning with "People can be forced to..", I mean to say, "a promise of life,.."

 2. In para 1 of post 2 below, Indian LPG imports are soon to average 1 million tons a MONTH. 

Nikhil Desai

All post-mature deaths are WHO's blessings. 

Q
> 
>   1. Re: Thought on TC 285 process 
>   2. Off-topic news: World LPG imports 
> 
> 
> -----------------------------------------------
> 
> Message: 1
> Date: Wed, 26 Apr 2017 12:26:42 +0530
> From: Nikhil Desai <pienergy2008 at gmail.com>
> To: Discussion of biomass cooking stoves
>    <stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org>
> Subject: Re: [Stoves] Thought on TC 285 process
> Message-ID: <FCCFBE32-287F-48BE-9E28-2BCD42D60101 at gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
> 
> This is in response to Ron's 3 April post below. I will have more to say on TC 285 objectives - not process, which Ron knows about and I don't - later on. 
> 
> First, I wonder what is meant by the assertion "Standards are not effective until they are complete and published."
> 
> In the legal sense, this is valid up to a point. Who is to publish and where, how? The EPA and ANSI have no jurisdiction or mandate to do anything with cookstoves in any country, including their own. I for one don't see any basis under US law authorizing EPA meddling here. For any other country, including but not limited to the TC 285 member countries, it will have to publish the standards under its own laws for them to be effective, i. e., enforceable. Then it's problematic whether countries that cannot have enough police enforcement, or enforcement of chemical spills, building safety or power plant regulations will have enough customs inspectors for imported cookstoves or university children volunteering to be stove operations certifiers. 
> 
> I happen to have some familiarity with ISO processes as relates to another class of consumer products offered to the poor in the developing countries - the so-called Solar Home Systems (about 23 years ago) and Pico-PV lanterns and phone chargers (about 8-12 years ago).  In one case, standards did help catalyze a market in some countries under foreign aid projects; the other has been less shining. 
> 
> The technology exists. The standards exist. There is no basic variation in the service standard or the public policy objective across regions. There are, however, options to solar - the grid or the generator or battery-charging by them. 
> 
> The net result of some 50 years of research and advocacy for PV lighting for the poor, after the standards? A lot of PV debris around the world - not many systems in working conditions. (I stopped keeping the count ten years ago because REN21 started doing that. I stopped being their reviewer but might contribute this coming year).
> 
> Past failures in a different technology are no guarantee of future failures. Still, it is worth going back to check the validity of the primary assumption behind TC 285 exercise - that somehow the publication, adoption and enforcement of stove standards will change anything, at least as far as solid fuels are concerned. 
> 
> People can be forced or incentivized to make assumptions. I for one take the Tier 4 proposed target for hourly PM 2.5 emission rate as WHO's sexy kiss of death for solid fuel cookstoves for the poor. It is a promise or life, served in a poison pill. 
> 
> -----------
> I am sympathetic to those who have burnt kilo liters of midnight oil designing and testing biomass stoves, boiling waters and inhaling smokes. Even when the TC 285 standards are legally effective and enforced, I wonder whether they would be effective in achieving the clients' objectives. 
> 
> I have very little confidence that ISO standards for specific tiers will mean much to anybody. Without a service standard, lab testing protocols mean nothing, and without an objective (or more), performance metrics mean nothing. 
> 
> I repeat - boiling water is not a service standard. And emission rates or fuel efficiency may not be - perhaps are not - relevant to other objectives of the cook. 
> 
> Waving arms has to stop when we land on earth. 
> 
> There is no basis for assuming that fuel  efficiency and PM 2.5 hourly average emission rates have predictable outcomes to be relevant across all contexts. Or that these metrics have controlling influence on changing stoves. 
> 
> The tragedy of the poor is that presumptively well-meaning outsiders come to disturb the intimate parts of their life and then, based on some anecdotes and unrepresentative measurements, publish thousands of pages of data and theories that have provably led to failures in mass adoption of new biomass stoves. 
> 
> TC 285 has been a US driven fantasy, with no justification for WHO interference - in the form of SFU Guidelines or throwing in ludicrous air models and Kirk Smith's theology of "truly health protective" emission rates (instead of exposures).
> 
> Oh, well. The Implementation Scientists are ready to roll with LPG and electricity - both of which I do favor, next to eating out and home deliveries - because we lost quite a bit of ground arguing about WBT and protecting, praying to holy cows, taking, praising all their gifts. Thank God, LPG prices are low enough to make India the largest LPG importer (followed by China and Japan).
> 
> When and how did the biomass cookstove business become so dominated by the EPA? Paul, Crispin, Tom, Ron?? This is not how I remember about 12 years ago, after which I fell off the cliff. 
> 
> I suspect this whole ISO affair - publish international standards, force or incentivize miracle clean cookstoves to reach 100 million households by 2020 - is PCIA/EPA legacy thrust upon the GACC CEO. She was fed an utterly wrong script and may find it difficult to defend not just TC 285 operations but the underlying assumption that international standards would have any quick benefits for anybody. 
> 
> EPA may be forced to shut down coming Friday unless Trump and the Congress can reach an agreement on spending authority for the next 153 days. 
> 
> Nikhil 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Nikhil Desai
> (India +91) 909 995 2080
> Skype: nikhildesai888
> 
> 
>> On Mon, Apr 3, 2017 at 9:55 PM, Ronal W. Larson <rongretlarson at comcast.net> wrote:
>> List:
>> 
>>            As a fledgling member of the ANSI part of the ongoing TC 285 process I was able to listen in 6 days ago as representatives for several dozen countries commented on inputs from a smaller number of recent country deliberations (on which I had also listened earlier - only to the US discussion).  The rules of the ISO process preclude my/anyone giving out details;  the rules say we must wait for a final consensus approved document.  But I think it is OK for someone like myself who has not influenced the document in any way to say that I have been impressed with the entire process.  The stove community should be proud that a huge amount of volunteer effort has been invested in producing about 7 different documents- most nearing completion.
>> 
>>            Here is one slide from last week that summarizes where I am at for this forthcoming standard: .  I think ones like this and similar slides will be available soon on the ETHOS website.
>> 
>>    In sum - there has been a great deal of good work that  I urge we get behind.
>> Ron
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> ------------------------------
> 
> Message: 2
> Date: Wed, 26 Apr 2017 13:51:20 +0530
> From: Nikhil Desai <pienergy2008 at gmail.com>
> To: Discussion of biomass cooking stoves
>    <stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org>
> Cc: Crispin Pemberton-Pigott <crispinpigott at outlook.com>,    Ron Larson
>    <rongretlarson at comcast.net>, Paul Anderson <psanders at ilstu.edu>
> Subject: [Stoves] Off-topic news: World LPG imports
> Message-ID: <C38FC928-F447-4DE7-82AB-58602F06914C at gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
> 
> Indian companies could be importing a million tons a year of LPG soon. That's probably around $600 m a year, just when export revenues from body shops are threatened by Trump.  News item below. 
> 
> Now HAP causes 1.3 m premature deaths in India compared to 0.9 m just recently?
> 
> Proving that the increase in LPG use is detrimental to human health!
> 
> Quantification of individual health damage and benefits for large populations over short terms is the last thing that is needed for transitioning away from dirty cooking. 
> 
> Let WHO put forward five Indians whose premature mortality was averted by LPG use. And argue that $150 billion a year subsidy for Tier 4 cookstoves - my estimate of 700 million households at 200 kg-eq a year and average subsidy of $1 per kg-eq (and the usual 7%) - will lead to 5 million fewer death certificates a year. 
> 
> Nikhil
> 
>>> 
>>> PM Narendra Modi push for safer kitchens makes India no. 2 LPG importer
>>> Imports of LPG soared 23 percent to 11 million tons, according to data from oil ministry?s Petroleum Planning & Analysis Cell.
>>> By: Bloomberg | Published:April 24, 2017
>>> http://indianexpress.com/article/india/pm-narendra-modi-push-for-safer-kitchens-makes-india-no-2-lpg-importer-4626102/
>>> 
>>> <image001.jpg>
>>> 
>>> <image002.gif>PM Narendra Modi.
>>> 
>>> India toppled Japan as the world?s second-largest importer of liquefied petroleum gas as Prime Minister Narendra Modi?s pledge to provide cooking gas cylinders to the poor and wean them off polluting fuels drove up consumption. Imports of LPG, mostly used as cooking fuel, soared 23 percent during the financial year that ended March 31 to 11 million tons, according to data from oil ministry?s Petroleum Planning & Analysis Cell. Japan?s imports slipped 3.2 percent during the same period to 10.6 million tons, according to its finance ministry. China remains the world?s top importer.
>>> Modi?s government in May 2016 embarked on a drive to provide free cooking gas connections to women from extremely poor households, aimed at reducing the use of polluting fuels such as wood and dried cow dung that, according to the World Health Organization, causes 1.3 million premature deaths in India every year. This push led to a record distribution of 32.5 million new cooking gas connections during the year. ?It?s a game changer,? said Ong Han Wee, who heads the LPG team at Singapore-based Facts Global Energy. ?Never in history we have seen such huge LPG usage in India. LPG will remain main cooking fuel for India over next two decades.?
>>> Fueling Kitchens
>>> Free gas connections coupled with at least two other government programs have taken India?s active LPG user count to about 200 million, about 60 percent more than Japan?s entire population. India aims to increase LPG usage to cover 80 percent of its households by March 2019, against 72.8 percent as on April 1. Japan on the other hand is cutting back on LPG as a cooking fuel and is moving to cheaper alternatives such as natural gas, according to Ong.
>>> The target of adding 50 million new LPG users will boost demand for the fuel by 10 percent for the next two years, according to Nevyn Nah, oil product analyst at industry consultant Energy Aspects Ltd. ?Thereafter, we have to see what India plans for future growth.?
>>> Soaring Demand
>>> India?s consumption of LPG during the year to March 31 was 21.55 million tons, registering a 9.8 percent growth from the previous year. Demand for the fuel may touch 35 million tons by 2031-32 due to an increase in the penetration of cooking gas connections in rural areas, Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan told Indian lawmakers last month. The nation added 21 million new users in the past year under a program to increase access for the poor to LPG, he said on Monday.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> According to estimates by the PPAC, India?s LPG consumption is expected to grow 9.7 percent in the current financial year that started April 1 to 23.7 million tons. Overseas purchases are poised to become the dominant source of the fuel in 2017-18, as consumption surpasses local production, according to an oil ministry official. India imports 40 percent of its LPG requirements, predominantly from the Middle East, and is discussing long-term import contracts with exporting nations, Pradhan said in March.
>>> ?A million tons a month LPG imports will soon be a reality,? said Facts Global?s Ong. ?Impact of India?s growing LPG usage will become more visible on global markets over coming years.?
>>> For all the latest India News, download Indian Express App now
>>> .
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