[Stoves] Declaration about Woodgas

Tue Oct 24 16:44:57 CDT 2017

>
> Dear Ron:
>
> Sorry for the misunderstanding.
>
>
> *[RWL2:  Can you clarify - if not explained below?  I take this to
> mean the you disagreed with everything I said about adding to
> Paul’s “Declaration”.]*
> ND: I meant the "negative carbon-climate-related health aspects of LPG".
> What is the negative health aspect of LPG? Kirk Smith's computations for
> Relative Risks are with LPG use as the counter-factual, i.e., LPG is by
> definition the cleanest cooking alternative. Do you disagree with him?
>
> Rest between ****.
>
> Nikhil
>
>
>
> On Mon, Oct 23, 2017 at 9:44 PM, Ronal W. Larson <
> rongretlarson at comcast.net> wrote:
>
>> See insert below.
>>
>>
>> On Oct 23, 2017, at 5:24 PM, Nikhil Desai <pienergy2008 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Ron:
>>
>> Curious - "negative carbon-climate-related health aspects of LPG"??
>>
>> You mean EPA’s endangerment finding for the US? or Obams’s EPA,  No for
>> Trump’s
>>
>> RWL1.  Yes for Obama’s EPA, no for Trump’s.
>>
>
> *** There is only one EPA and only one endangerment finding. What does
> that have to do with LPG? ***
>
>>
>> You threw me in a spin.
>>
>> *[RWL2:  Can you clarify - if not explained below?  I take this to
>> mean the you disagreed with everything I said about adding to
>> Paul’s “Declaration”.*
>>
>> All things considered, the discounted present value of switching to LPG
>> over the next ten years is much higher than due to anything else.
>>
>> *[RWL3  Y*es - higher in negative terms.    I interpret your argument to
>> be higher in positive terms.  The negatives of LPG far outweigh the
>> positives - in comparing with biochar.  I don’t understand your last “due
>> to anything else”.
>>
>> *** Yes, the discounted PV of switch is positive, i.e., there are
> benefits of mass LPG switch. Do you disagree with Kirk Smith? He has said
> that the household cooking and heating problem is primarily health problem,
> and that renewability, climate, etc. are red herrings. I agree with him,
> though not with his methods of quantification of burden of disease or
> benefits of cooking interventions. If at all, I think the mental  health
> burden of traditional cooking is entirely ignored but few people have
> bothered to ask the cook.
>
> I disagree with Prof. Smith that solid fuels cannot be burned cleanly -
> say, to achieve 2 g/hr PM 2.5 emission limits. I think you too would agree
> with me. When I meant "due to anything else", I only meant that in the
> near-term, the integral of benefits from cooking fuel/technology
> interventions using LPG is higher than any other fuel/technology
> interventions. Ask Prof. Smith.  Nothing else has a large enough potential
> in terms of market size multiplied with unit reductions in exposures,
> however modeled. ***
>
>> Whatever jugglery one does in unit terms, LPG simply has a higher market
>> volume captured relatively quickly. Has been going on for at least 50 years
>> in countries who had their own refinery LPG.  Also applies to natural gas
>> and LNG.
>>
>> [RWL4:  I have no idea what these two sentences mean - except it seems to
>> be a justification for everything fossil.
>>
>> *** Nothing to do with fossil. Looks like everything reminds you of
> fossil, while everything reminds me of life. Life on this planet in the
> last 50 years would have been unaimaginably poor without fossil fuels. Or
> for the next 50 years. ***
>
>>
>> And if  you were to rate the marginal improvement in the welfare of the
>> poor higher than that for the super-rich of the US, LPG, gas, electricity
>> (from whatever means) win hands down as far as combustion fuel or
>> equivalent are concerned.
>>
>> *RWL5:   *Yes for those energy forms that are carbon neutral (wind, PV,
>> hydro geothermal, biomass and doubly so for those that are carbon negative
>> - the best being biochar. )
>> LPG is OK - only if you ignore atmospheric CO2 (which no-one should).
>>
>> *** Not every molecule of CO2 is a weapon or mass destruction, nor is
> every particle in the air. If one were to rank unit cost of carbon
> sequestration, perhaps biochar is a good project. Please leave poor people
> to burn charcoal or store or sell it.  Climate policy is Western
> neoimperialism, a war against the poor. ***
>
>> The argument in support of wood gas is simply that the WHO propaganda on
>> solid fuels being dirty is utter nonsense, and that solid biomass can be
>> burned cleanly at a much lower cost, given the right market incentives and
>> innovation support.
>>
>> *[RWL6:  *I* do not consider anything (repeat - ANYTHING) from WHO to
>> be “utter nonsense**”.   I repeat (rom an earlier message to you)
>> that your argument is the same as was given (decades ago) about health
>> aspects of cigarettes.  I have seen a lot of data comparing emissions from
>> LPG stoves with biomass loves.  I don’t ever remember seeing ** LPG
>> losing.  Your counter evidence?   Do you feel the data showing cigarettes
>> are unhealthy to be overwhelming or weak?*
>>
>> *** Oh, you then agree with WHO that solid fuels combustion is a
>> surrogate for "dirty cooking", i.e., biomass is dirty by assumption. If you
>> find a lot of sense in the argument that # of household claiming to rely
>> primarily on solid fuels for cooking and heating is the indicator of
>> household pollution exposure, or that the first-round SDG 3.9.1 metric -
>> reduction in such % of households using solid fuels (which means biomass
>> for the most part) - is the sign of sustainable development, I cannot argue
>> with you.  As far as I am concerned, WHO's claim that solid fuels are dirty
>> is nonsense, won't you? ***
>>
>> That does not mean that other competing solid fuel combustion
>> technologies rate any less respect if intellectual respect has any merit. -
>>
>> *[RWL7:   The only other solid fuel I can think of is coal - which should
>> be immediately outlawed - for both short and long term health reasons and
>> (not least) for economic damages due to ocean sea rise, acidification, etc.*
>> .
>>
>
> *** Dream on, sir. Why don't you begin with Colorado? I just found
> Colorado CO2 emissions from coal in 2015 were about the same as those in
> 1990 - 32 million tons. For the whole of US and from all fossil fuels, it
> was roughly the same - 5.2 billion tons vs. 5 billion tons. For less than a
> billion tons of CO2 from coal-fired electricity using the Best Available
> Control Technologies,  about 5 billion tons of CO2 from biomass cookstoves
> can be eliminated. The anti-fossil zeal is Western neo-imperialism.
>
> But rest assured, I did not have coal in mind. When I said "other
> competing solid fuel combustion technologies", I meant other biomass-based
> technologies other than wood gas.
>
> I will sign on to worldwide outlawing of coal by 2100, unless it turns out
> that a little sulfur in coal would keep the earth cool, as James Hansen has
> argued in his "Faustian Bargain" paper.
>
> Or tell me you even disagree with James Hansen.***
>
>>
>>
>> (Not in my books.
>> *[RWL8:   Does this mean that intellectual respect has no merit?
>>   Weird.   Can you state this without a negative?*
>>
>> *** Oh, these days I don't know. So much intellectual smoke being spewed
>> that honest discussions of limitations and cautions are ignored. Just read
>> Kirk Smith's assumptions in HAPIT or in his Millions Dead paper, and tell
>> me what you disagree with.  To state without a negative, "In my books,
>> intellectual respect has merit. Therefore, fuel/stove fads that are found
>> usable and used by the consumers deserve support." Even if they are solid
>> fuels, and even coal. Please understand the compulsions of the poor, not
>> the compulsions of bureaucrats and professors. ****
>>
>
>
>>  I count money.)
>> *[RWL9:   Almost everyone counts money.  The key climate and health
>> economics question is what discount rate?   I favor zero or close to it.
>> Your choice for discount rate?*
>>
>
> *** The overnight moneylender rate without collateral in the villages of
> the Third World. Comes to 1-2%. Per day. For national governments, the
> local 10-year government bond rate plus 50-100% risk penalty. If you have a
> zero percent discount rate, please tell the youth that they should never
> save a dime. I think of discount rate in terms of the individual who is
> making the decision to consume or save or borrow or lend.  ***
>
>>
>>
>> *Ron*
>>
>>
>>
>> Nikhil
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Oct 23, 2017 at 5:23 PM, Ronal W. Larson <
>> rongretlarson at comcast.net> wrote:
>>
>>> PAUL,  CC LIST AND NIKHIL:
>>>
>>> I am handicapped as I write this - as I also am away from home.  Please
>>> include me as a signee.
>>>
>>> But I feel you have left out several of the most important aspects of
>>> TLUDs.  Foremost is that such stoves can earn (more than save) money for
>>> the users.  Using the phrase “Terra Preta” can prove the out-year benefits
>>> of placing char in soil.  And saving time while the stove is in operation.
>>> And being able to use leaves and very small biomass.
>>>
>>> Your emphasizing the health benefits of TLUDs is very important- but we
>>> can also support solar cookers, which when combined with TLUDs (why should
>>> they not choose TLUDs as their needed backup?) would be the absolute
>>> cleanest of all fuel choices.  And we can knock the negative
>>> carbon-climate-related health aspects of LPG (in a “whereas”).
>>>
>>> Ron
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>
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