[Stoves] China and cookstoves [Was Re: A user-centered, iterative engineering approach for advanced biomass cookstove design and development]

[franke at cruzio.com]

Todd and Stovers,

Perhaps I got myself in a little hot water with this one. I can’t argue
the best stoves were used to produce the great meal you write about (with
pictures!) and a TLUD did not do (and most likely could not do) all that
was cooked.

The point I want to make (and trying for the last ten years!) is the
approach we take to develop stoves. Starting with the 3-stone fire and
going to the Rocket Stove is a big jump. The rocket funnels the hot gasses
to a secondary where the energy is precisely used.  The biomass fuel is
completely burned to white ash releasing all its energy. Unlike the
3-stone fire.  The TLUD comes along and does the same thing but leaves
behind the biomass (char) containing energy not required for the task.
This is a jump again in stove development with the goal being to complete
a task using the least energy required.

Not that we need or that its best to use stoves that use the least energy.
But that it will be good to know how to do that and there will be places
where it might be needed. It takes the same amount of energy to cook
something (boxes 4, 5 & 6 controlled) so a stove that uses more energy the
excess is wasted.

We can always go back to the 3-stone fire. Let’s see how far forward we
can go. The next step for the TLUD is control over the Box-1 Fuel and Box
2 delivery or packing. And has been the next step for years! Using real
wild biomass to complete real tasks is needed for the research. Using
processed fuels that will never be found when the stoves are delivered and
picking a task like PM2.5 rather than a real task for some research
project someone got money for has wasted time and money IMO..

Getting control over the studies will require labs like Aprovecho to test
the fuels along with field studies as both are needed so the research can
be replicated. - Frank

Gabilan Laboratory



> Frank:
>
> I guess you don't do much cooking.  The rocket stove is not "so
> Yesterday".  Nonsense.  While a TLUD is an amazing batch stove for lots of
> dishes and styles of cooking, a rocket stove is indispensable for many
> cooking tasks a TLUD is not as well suited for.  A rocket is the preferred
> stove for browning, where a handful of sticks can quickly brown a large
> roast as done in photo below, prior to being roasted in our Dragon Oven.
> In the photo here the roast is being browned in the finned wok.  Although
> the stove of choice for grilling meat on the Himalayan salt blocks below
> was our TLUD chimney stove.  In fact with lots of cooking, you'll find
> they
> actually are very complementary.  Quick dishes can be prepared more
> efficiently, using less fuel & emissions on a rocket stove, while longer
> duration cooking is often more ideal on a TLUD, but not always.  Bottom
> line, there is no one answer.  A stove is a cooking tool, and there are
> specific jobs that one may out perform the other, depending on desired
> outcomes.
>
>
>
>
>
> ​
> 6 beautifully browned 3.5KG Top Sirloin Roasts in our Dragon Oven, browned
> on our SilverFire Survivor rocket stove.  We served over 5,000 folks for 3
> days straight using a combination of rocket & TLUD stoves at this event.
> One of our favorite clients is a national BBQ champion.    Although he has
> also owns $25K commercial pits, his 3 favorite and most efficient cooking
> devices are a Santa Maria Grill, our SilverFire Dragon Oven, and our
> Survivor Rocket Stove.  He owns several TLUDs, Kamado cookers, and
> numerous
> other cooking devices as well.  FYI:  A rocket stove can also be top lit
> or
> through the door.  A rocket stove can be as easy to light as a TLUD stove
> too.  A well insulated rocket stove monitored is as safe as a TLUD.  We
> also would not agree a TLUD is more predictable either.
>
> Regards,  Todd Albi SilverFire
>
>
>
> On Wed, Dec 6, 2017 at 12:35 PM, <franke at cruzio.com> wrote:
>
>> Nikhil, Stovers,
>> The goal of stove designing is a stove that will use only the energy
>> required and placed at the location it is needed. The TLUD is a fine
>> precision machinery that does just that.
>>
>> As to what people care about and not will differ from people to people
>> and
>> location. You give just one example and I am sure that is true for some
>> people at some location. But I really don’t care. Its not something of
>> concern to me.
>>
>> The TLUDD extracting the volatile energy required and locating it under
>> the pot where released results in the following:
>> 1)      Cooler (safer) stove because the char is not combusted.
>> 2)      Cooks not cooking over a hot stove
>> 3)      Cooks not cooking in a real hot room
>> 4)      Char left can be used in another stove
>> 5)      Char left is much better for ag soil than high oxides and
>> carbonates
>> found in ash
>> 6)      Much easier to lite than a Rocket type stove
>> 7)      Much more predictable than a Rocket type stove.
>>
>> All the above is, or can be, true once we control the fuel and delivery
>> (packing for the TLUD). This done by deciding the properties of biomass
>> important and test methods used to evaluate them and certified labs
>> shown
>> to be able to conduct the tests.
>>
>> The Rocket Stove is – well – so Yesterday
>> Frank
>> Gabilan Laboratory
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> > Frank:
>> >
>> > Users may not care if energy is wasted.
>> >
>> > In fact, I have seen only minor evidence that they do. Most of it is
>> > anecdotal or indirect - whether the old stoves from China we saw
>> pictures
>> > of (from Todd, I believe) and other stoves were this size of that,
>> this
>> > kind of airflow or that.
>> >
>> > It is not the valuation put on wasted energy but rather the capital
>> cost
>> > of
>> > equipment, operating cost and hassle factors, that impede transition
>> to
>> > allegedly more efficient stoves.
>> >
>> > I repeat - there is no evidence that minimizing energy waste has any
>> > particular consequence for anything. Much energy is wasted, simply
>> because
>> > it is too costly to save energy.
>> >
>> > This, after all, was the teaching in home economics --- a woman
>> > multi-tasks
>> > in keeping a home, and has to save on everything - money, her time,
>> food
>> > ingredients,fuel - and has to continually optimize and re-optimize her
>> > behavior so she can place food on the table (or floor), and also has
>> to
>> > feed little children by her own hands.
>> >
>> > I argue that it is understanding the home economy of poor people --
>> not
>> > just doing surveys and concocting statistics -- that would explain why
>> > there hasn't been much uptake of "improved stoves".
>> >
>> > Counting beans and Btus is about the same. Theory says one thing,
>> reality
>> > is different.
>> >
>> > Nikhil
>> >
>> > On Mon, Dec 4, 2017 at 10:43 PM, Frank Shields <travel at skyhighway.com>
>> > wrote:
>> >
>> >> Dear Ron,
>> >>
>> >> I'm thinking stoves not making char is wasting energy. If you have a
>> >> stove
>> >> that can complete a task and make char you are using all parts of the
>> >> biomass to the best advantage. Much of the heat produced going from
>> >> char-C
>> >> to gas-CO is left in the stove body - not cooking food. If you can
>> >> produce
>> >> a good flame at the secondary where the food is cooked without the
>> need
>> >> to
>> >> have a very hot stove to produce the right gasses for complete
>> >> combustion
>> >> you can save the biomass (char) left for other uses and not the need
>> to
>> >> oxidize it to ash.  And the TLUD seems to be able to do that!
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> Regards
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> Frank
>> >>
>> >>
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>>
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