[Stoves] matrix3

Nikhil Desai pienergy2008 at gmail.com
Fri Dec 22 08:26:35 CST 2017


Philip:

I have long been puzzled by charcoal use and non-use. I had long assumed
that charcoal is a fuel of choice in urban environments and can be a
sustainable business.

During my childhood in the 1950s, we cooked or heated water with charcoal
and kerosene in the city and those plus wood in the villages. Later I
learned that kerosene had been coming from Bombay since at least the 1940s,
even during WWII (when it was rationed for household uses and continued
till this year). Charcoal for cities went back to the 19th Century and a
charcoal traders association has been in existence in my city for some 110
years. The province I come from does not have much of a forest left since
at least the 19th Century and much of the land is semi-arid, some even a
desert. Yet, it is precisely from near that desert that charcoal is sent to
cities all the way north. (Charcoaling is prohibited in the northern
mountainous regions.)

To me, this is evidence that charcoaling has little to do with feedstock
scarcity - wood can be grown; thin, quickly growing species are good enough
for charcoal and don't require that much land, water and labor. It can be a
sustainable, profitable business. Yes, this is different from those rich
enough to own land and grow their own hardwood species and charcoaling for
themselves.

Then comes the demand part - why do some people want to use wood and not
charcoal? When I started traveling in Africa, I found charcoal in almost
every city I went to in east or southern Africa; don't remember Jo'burg.
Same in Vanuatu and Afghanistan.

I had thus taken it for granted that from wood to charcoal was a "natural"
progression - even as I railed against the "ladder model" of cooking - and
was surprised that some cities in India did not have charcoal use in
households.

I am cc'ing Anil and Dr Karve to see if they have any reactions.

My working hypothesis is that people who don't want to use charcoal have
other cheaper or more convenient fuel sources and have stoves designed to
use wood rather than charcoal. Conversely, wood to charcoal is a distinct
transition in household fuel economy - from the drudgery of wood collection
and handling to purchased - even home-delivered - charcoal. It is a sign of
"progress".

Charcoal - especially from low-cost sources such as waste biomass - signals
an adjustment to cooking that people willingly make as family dynamics
(girls staying longer in school) and demographics (location, family size)
change. The transition does not have to be complete; stacking is great.

Looking at household cooking strictly from the angle of thermodynamics and
stove efficiency is misleading. Has been and will always be. Cooking and
eating are personal and societal phenomena whose tentacles spread way
outside of a "household".

Just as we don't have a definition of what a stove means or what cooking
means, we also don't have a definition of what a household is.

But if marketing to donors is the goal, I see no problem with Ron's matrix.
This is pretty much what GACCC gas is.

Nikhil


On Fri, Dec 22, 2017 at 4:06 AM, Philip Lloyd <plloyd at mweb.co.za> wrote:

> It made it through my system.  A few things were missing - like user
> acceptance. A few things were included, which were so obviously marketing
> that I question their value.  All those +++ against charcoal.  I have
> nothing against charcoal, but all the biomass users with whom I interact
> want to use all the energy in the wood they laboriously harvest, not use
> only half and then have to store the black stuff that remains. Preaching
> biochar or charcoal cooking to them has not worked.
>
> Prof Philip Lloyd
> Energy Institute, CPUT
> PO Box 1906
> Bellville 7535
> Tel 021 959 4323
> Cell 083 441 5247
> PA Nadia 021 959 4330
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Stoves [mailto:stoves-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On Behalf
> Of Ronal W. Larson
> Sent: Friday, December 22, 2017 2:07 AM
> To: Discussion of biomass
> Subject: [Stoves] matrix3
>
> List:
>
>         I am attaching a 3-page pdf file that is a first attempt to
> compare different  stove types on a societal scale.  The words “WBT” and
> “fuel type” are not there.
> Please let me know if this didn’t make it through your system;  I can send
> this in other than pdf form.
>
> Ron
>
>
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