[Stoves] Top lit updraft combustors

Tue Dec 19 14:57:08 CST 2017

Dear Andrew:

I suggest taking a look at this document from giz -  for the EnDev program
- Impacts - Observation Fields and Indicators.doc
<https://energypedia.info/wiki/File:Impacts_-_Observation_Fields_and_Indicators.doc>

This is from 2011, I suppose between the Lima Consensus and the IWA at the
Hague.

>From a programmatic perspective - say, I were to design a $100 m project,
with the idea that subsequent such projects would be demanded as necessary
- I would want a) customer acceptability, and b) having proved that -
perhaps via adoption of some other design to local fuels and use practices
- the kind of indicators giz proposes.

That is, it is an error to imagine that some "efficient" or "clean" Tier 4
rating means anything in terms of behavioral change and socially desired
impacts until usability and use are proven in practice.

Such an error has prevailed in the biomass woodstove world for decades now.
It is a top down - I call imperialist - view that disregards real people
real fuels, real food, read stoves and real cooking practices in pursuit of
some expert fantasies. Seems to me those pundits in ivory towers are
willing to compromise with EPA and assume "They are all the same" even as
they know better.

I don't know if giz is committed to forcing ISO FIS 19867-1 on all EnDev
countries, and if so, what strategy it would adopt for stove selection.
>From what I see in this document of theirs, I think they can do without
these "international standards", just monitor efficiency, emissions,
concentrations, and incidence of respiratory diseases for stoves that have
had found their market niche with particular fuels.

I think Crispin's pilots in Kyrgyzstan took this approach - where he did
find that it was possible to design a stove that virtually eliminated all
PM2.5 emissions, and brought down near-term respiratory disease incidence.

That is a far more practical approach - and one that respects people, local
fuel markets (though tweaking them toward marketing more specific or better
quality coal). None of this aDALY snake-oil.

The ideologues of CCAC, ICCI and GACC had this to say of the Stoves Summit
in Warsaw -

"It was noted that eliminating consideration of specific fuels such as coal
may suppress innovation and may not result in desired results, given the
ubiquity of coal use in some regions and biomass use worldwide; however,
use of coal in households runs counter to the WHO’s strong recommendation,
in the Indoor Air Quality Guidelines, against any use of unprocessed coal
in households."

This is ideological adventurism. The form of the fuel - raw or processed
coal - does not determine its emission performance; stove design and
operation do. All I can see is another form of Western imperialism - or
excuses to get more grants.

You say, "black carbon particles from biomass fires are the ones that have
been implicated in lung problems and possibly once they get into
the bloodstream are DNA disruptors"

Not all PM2.5 is black carbon. And as for PM2.5, it is the assumption of
equitoxicity that leads to findings of strong association, no causality as
yet. To me, the case of PM2.5 - proving causality in both directions (i.e.,
reduction in PM2.5 reduces incidence of certain class of diseases over a
lifetime - does not yet exist. Environmental health zealots have found
PM2.5 are Weapons of Mass Destruction, and have mounted a Global War on
Terror of Solid Fuels.

This is subversive propaganda against the poor and their governments. Until
such a time that a Savior Stove is affordable enough and used exclusively,
there has to be a balance between usability, cost, and particular
attributes - see the giz document. (Yes, despite their use of WBT, I find
the overall approach practical, not puritanical or based on health fascism
- "truly health protective" and "no stacking". )

If you don't define a "service standard", you essentially dismiss reality
of actual cooks, foods, and fuels. If I had to design a cookstove project
to spend real money, I wouldn't rely on an academic stove. (Remember Hyman
Rickover's message about a practical reactor and an academic reactor).

Nikhil

On Sun, Dec 17, 2017 at 5:44 PM, Andrew Heggie <aj.heggie at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 16 December 2017 at 19:39, Nikhil Desai <pienergy2008 at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > What would PM per kg or MJ do? (It also has to have a time dimension and
> a
> > location/spatial dimension). What would such PM per kg per minute do for
> > whom and how? Under what theory of change in what else that may also
> change
> > in mere cooking fuel PM emission rates?
>
> Well as far as I can tell the PM I am interested in are formed during
> secondary combustion so it should give some guidance on how to improve
> that. To my mind the nearer we can get to the  cleanliness of the
> other clean cooking sources the more likely they will be attractive to
> those that aspire to these cleaner cooking methods but have no access
> to them. Now I doubt I will ever be able to risk cooking indoors with
> biomass as I do with an open natural gas flame but...
>
> Lest you think I'm strangely obsessive let me reassure you I am [1]
> >
> > PM arises from different sources. PM emission rates from a cookstove
> (let's
> > stick to primary solid fuels, not processed fuels or charcoal for
> cooking)
> > vary according to combustion conditions, type and quality of fuel,
> location,
> > air flow. Other PM sources are often right around - from mud floor and
> walls
> > to animal husbandry sources, land, plants nearby.
>
> Yes but as I said in a recent post as far as I can see the black
> carbon particles from biomass fires are the ones that have been
> implicated in lung problems and possibly once they get into the
> bloodstream are DNA disruptors.
> >
> > The levels of concentrations "in" and "outside" - terms that do not have
> > uniform meanings worldwide, compared to US or UK rural single family
> homes -
> > homes vary, and so do exposures. There is no standard cook, standard
> home,
> > standard neighborhood with standard transport network and standard land,
> > trees, livestock, wind.
>
> So what, I'm interested in reducing soot from stoves, removing other
> sources of pollution in the local environment is beyond the scope of
> this list.
> >
> > But let me stick to just fuel emission rates. Data on source, quality,
> and
> > cost of fuel have to be collected and cooking behavior modeled according
> to
> > not just the variables above but these economic signals. Which means a
> > "service standard"- a multi-dimensional practice, not just changing the
> > power level of a stove - has to be defined.
>
> Not for my purposes.
>
> < big snip>
>
> >
> > Even for poor people's fuelwood for cooking, something similar goes on,
> at
> > least in the parts of India and Africa I am familiar with. Cutting and
> > stacking wood is part of the work cycle across seasons. Some wood is
> > obtained daily or weekly and some stored for winters and monsoons. They
> know
> > their wood requirements from years of cooking and heating practice. Like
> > you, they too think fuel economy is but one part of choosing a stove.
> >
> > In short, the IWA is a top-down lie.
>
> Yes you have got across that particular rant and I have posted today about
> it.
>
> It does not affect my wish to reduce particulate emissions from
> stoves, in the early days of this list we were introduced to the
> Reed-Larson cookstove with its good emissions, I played with the
> technique a lot nearly 20 years ago, used my eyes and nose to detect
> acridity of emissions but have never been able to see particulates
> other than looking at the bottom of a pot.
>
> [1] As I mentioned fuel consumption I'll carry on: in my last paid
> work I had responsibility for the firm's vehicles and I monitored fuel
> consumption, two other people drove the same type of vehicle with a
> 1.4 litre diesel engine. I consistently managed to achieve mileage
> figures of 60-70mpg and handed my vehicle back with 305k miles on the
> odometer. The other two  never managed to get better than 50mpg
> although one did get to 300k miles in 3 years less before he blew the
> engine.
>
> Andrew
>
> ______________________
>
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