[Stoves] Domestic stoves, air pollution and health ==> Back to basics

[Traveller]

Harold:

Your key to "Back to basics" was -- "*Develop a standard method for testing
the energy and emissions performance of a domestic stove designed for
cooking and space heating*,"

I wonder if you mean a standard method independent of the context in which
these stoves are design and used?

If not, the whole Lima Agreement and IWA have to be junked.

And replaced with something serious at the sub-national levels (to be
decided according to economic geographies and capacities for intervention,
among other things) that respects the contextual significance of "fuel
consumption" and "emissions".

I for one do not believe that "efficiency" and "emissions" are uniformly
relevant; their importance - relative to other elements of "stove
performance" as judged by users such as convenience, versatility,
functional diversity, ability to adjust time and fuel management - varies
by context.

The problem is, how are "emission rates" to be judged, other than for CO,
NMVOCs, SO2? If PM2.5, the "box paradigm" becomes paramount, if only with
different parameters depending on the context. And these EPA, BAMG wild
horses will go any distance to argue "premature mortality" consequences to,
um, death!

The fundamental error was in setting Tiers. I think it was meant to satisfy
the group. I wasn't there and haven't heard from anybody present. But I saw
your name in the Strategic Business Plan, so I wonder if you have an answer
-- can "emission rates" be assigned any rating in terms of "clean"?

If not, I have no problem.

Same thing about "efficiency". If no claims of saving trees or monies or
collection time accompany these "standard methods", I have no problem
either.

But that means much of the decades-long history of solid fuel stoving has
to be discarded.

Perhaps time has come to do just that -- to test stoves in contextually
specified method, but without any prejudices as to the impacts of those
results.

If you and other stove experts concede that, I will be very happy. For a
day.

***********************
What this leads to is another way of helping poor cooks. It implies -

a) Forget the emission-health paradigm. It is too much smoke and too many
mirrors. WHO and EPA have no jurisdiction to dabble in stoves policy, which
essentially must be contextual and focus on usability of stoves -
functionality, durability - for a certain menu and time and time
constraint. (Not how many minutes does it take to boil two liters of water
but rather, what can be done in 30 minutes, 50 minutes, 90 minutes for a
given menu? It need not matter if the menu is the same as in current
practice or that the time requirement is the same for a particular task;
people adjust. Just give us ratings that mean something in use.)

b) Cleaner air is a matter of targets, policies and measures for a
particular geography, cohort (age/sex distribution), and schedule for
compliance with nationally legislated AAQs, i.e., "contextual". It is
insane to target only household stoves, nationwide. There is no logic in
eliminating solid fuels everywhere as was done in the OECD countries' urban
areas between 1950s and 1990s. (They are still used in cities, suburbs and
rural areas of the US.) And NSPS process of EPA variety for residential
woodheaters is not the answer. All instruments of air quality management
need to be brought to the table - bans on fuel or combustion device type,
taxes and subsidies to encourage fuel substitution, knowledge and debates.
Call AWMA, not IHME or EPA, and heavens, not WHO or GACC.

c) "Biomass alone" is fuel fetishism. Renewability is contextual, and so is
the variety of biomass sources (wastes, for instance) and uses
(construction material, exports, fertilizer). Only an overall biomass
modernization strategy -- from landscaping around urban shopping malls to
making bricks out of leafwaste - can identify where the most urgent
interventions are worth a chance. Not - by a long shot - improved
woodstoves. (Charcoal and coal, sure.) High quality wood has better uses
than cooking, and non-wood biomass (i.e., excluding charcoal) is a
challenge for combustion except for bonfires.

d) Solid fuel household cookstoves will never be as versatile as gas and
electrical appliances for food, beverage, and hot water preparation. The
question is whether expected utilization rates will ever be high enough to
justify the capital investment costs in "clean enough". That points to
non-household markets as opportunistic targets.

Biomass stovers have had a credibility problem in the energy sector (except
for heating stoves, where coal is generally superior unless high quality
wood has no better use). That was the case in 1983 - when Fernando Manibog
reviewed the "improved stoves programs" - and remains the case today.
(Though I can argue against the skeptics as well. Otherwise I won't be on
this list.)

But no amount of technical competence is going to convince a non-technical
person that s/he is not being bamboozled. The "stover community" has no
credible quality checks on the contents of an argument (please check mine,
as Ron does). That's how ISO IWA started in the first place.

Debates over protocols are just the tip of the iceberg.

If a finance minister or a president were to ask me what I think of TC 285
and what s/he should do, I would now advise "Quit." It's as simple as that.

Nikhil



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