[Stoves] A user-centered, iterative engineering approach for advanced biomass cookstove design and development

Crispin Pemberton-Pigott crispinpigott at outlook.com
Wed Nov 29 12:44:01 CST 2017


Dear Friends

I just finished reading the paper. I believe they have published some results before on this stove. It look very familiar. This is a cite from the conclusion:

“Our results suggest that valuable engineering insights
are gained in the early stages of stove design through
targeted field-based data collection that yield information
unattainable in the laboratory.”

They have done a number of interesting things technically, and proved once again to my satisfaction that the WBT and the IWA tiers are not appropriate for evaluation performance during the development of a stove product.

The claimed performance improvement is based on WBT numbers, but when comparing the prediction of improvement with that realised in the field, there was a large gap. The quote says they got information from the field that was ‘unobtainable in the laboratory’. But they did not attempt to get such information in the lab. They used the WBT in the lab and much more realistic testing in the field. Who would expect them to align? The Tier performance claims should have been based on the field tests, or a lab-based replication of field behaviour.

An “advantage” for the test results is that as the stove produces basically no char, the impact of the skewing of efficiency numbers by mis-calculations in the WBT spreadsheet is minimised.

In order to improve the iterative development process the team should capture typical use patterns and develop a mixed cycle pattern to use in the lab so the number and seriousness of problems identified in the field are minimised to the extent possible.

The path they took is classic: Build a stove, test it using the WBT, get ‘answers’, take it to the field to find out that the WBT doesn’t predict performance very well, go back to the lab, modify the stove based on field experience, test using the WBT again, then go back to the field.

If they had used the typical operating behaviours observed in the field as their lab test sequence, and used the same calculations in the lab as they used in the field, the lab results would have been far closer to the field results.

While they have referenced the WBT as the one mentioned in the IWA 2012:11, they did not mentioned in the text which version of the WBT they used. They cite v 4.2.3 in the references. There are at least three versions of WBT 4.1.2 referenced in the IWA giving different results for efficiency and CO (etc), and several iterations have been released since. My caution is that they reference a number of articles published produced earlier versions of the WBT so the performance numbers are not directly comparable.

This does not affect their own work in-house, but it does affect any comparisons made to other published work and performance comparisons (particularly for efficiency metrics).

I compliment the approach taken in the development of the stove – getting user input and an iterative design process – as well as having no fear of using modern components to produce an appreciated user experience.

Best wishes
Crispin

From: Stoves [mailto:stoves-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of Paul Anderson
Sent: 29-Nov-17 11:05
To: Discussion of biomass cooking stoves <stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org>; Tom Miles <tmiles at trmiles.com>; xyang at tsinghua.edu.cn
Subject: Re: [Stoves] A user-centered, iterative engineering approach for advanced biomass cookstove design and development

Ron,

Not correct.   The stove type was not TLUD.  It was essentially a trickle-feed forced air pellet heater (as in the home heating units) but made at the size of a cooking stove.   Nice work, but not a TLUD and no real chance to make charcoal because the pellets are burned to ash under the streams of forced air.   It might become very successful.   Good approach to designing changes.  But also heavy and expensive compared to the TLUD stoves that are currently having great success in West Bengal.

Paul


Doc  /  Dr TLUD  /  Prof. Paul S. Anderson, PhD

Email:  psanders at ilstu.edu<mailto:psanders at ilstu.edu>

Skype:   paultlud    Phone: +1-309-452-7072

Website:  www.drtlud.com<https://nam04.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.drtlud.com&data=02%7C01%7Ccrispinpigott%40outlook.com%7C3a581c946f7b4906128b08d537436c4c%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636475685073265784&sdata=%2FskTy251zgXrOsnkVgBdxgZnAjF%2FQbP4eJ5pZOaTJvU%3D&reserved=0>
On 11/29/2017 9:18 AM, Ronal W. Larson wrote:
Tom and list:  (adding designated author)

                Thanks.   A well done article.  Quite favorable on TLUDS.   Main surprise was that they never use the word “charcoal”.  I think they would see even better user acceptance if char (for sale or biochar use) was an objective.  The authors must not know of this list.

Ron

On Nov 28, 2017, at 11:29 PM, Tom Miles <tmiles at trmiles.com<mailto:tmiles at trmiles.com>> wrote:

A user-centered, iterative engineering approach for advanced biomass cookstove design and development - https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aa804f<https://nam04.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fdoi.org%2F10.1088%2F1748-9326%2Faa804f&data=02%7C01%7Ccrispinpigott%40outlook.com%7C3a581c946f7b4906128b08d537436c4c%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636475685073265784&sdata=2UbhLmt%2BS%2B1Gf8SsCnzJmSSJ2%2FAcqVeK6VND2PPe7ro%3D&reserved=0>
Abstract
Unclean combustion of solid fuel for cooking and other household energy needs leads to severe household air pollution and adverse health impacts in adults and children. Replacing traditional solid fuel stoves with high efficiency, low-polluting semi-gasifier stoves can potentially contribute to addressing this global problem. The success of semi-gasifier cookstove implementation initiatives depends not only on the technical performance and safety of the stove, but also the compatibility of the stove design with local cooking practices, the needs and preferences of stove users, and community economic structures. Many past stove design initiatives have failed to address one or more of these dimensions during the design process, resulting in failure of stoves to achieve long-term, exclusive use and market penetration. This study presents a user-centered, iterative engineering design approach to developing a semi-gasifier biomass cookstove for rural Chinese homes. Our approach places equal emphasis on stove performance and meeting the preferences of individuals most likely to adopt the clean stove technology. Five stove prototypes were iteratively developed following energy market and policy evaluation, laboratory and field evaluations of stove performance and user experience, and direct interactions with stove users. The most current stove prototype achieved high performance in the field on thermal efficiency (ISO Tier 3) and pollutant emissions (ISO Tier 4), and was received favorably by rural households in the Sichuan province of Southwest China. Among household cooks receiving the final prototype of the intervention stove, 88% reported lighting and using it at least once. At five months post-intervention, the semi-gasifier stoves were used at least once on an average of 68% [95% CI: 43, 93] of days. Our proposed design strategy can be applied to other stove development initiatives in China and other countries.

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