[Stoves] Mongolia, Ulaanbaatar, ger stove air pollution

[Bill Munns]

Dear Crispin

Working as I am for a small UK charity aiding Mongolia's poorer herders, I follow events there including what is happening in UB. We provide no aid to 
the city, but for half of its 1.4 million population it is home to ex herders forced there from the countryside by past livestock disasters. It is to 
those still herding that our aid goes, mostly to dig pit wells for livestock, and hopefully to help sustain their livelihoods to continue herding as 
long as possible. Our sympathies are very much with them however, as thousands have been forced there by one hellish situation, only to face another 
equally, if not more hellish situation.

Their 'ger city' encampments are said to be the cause of 80% of the city's air pollution, with UB now alternating with Beijing as being the worst and 
second worst polluting cities anywhere in the world. In UB this results in 20% mortality of children under 5, and 10% of overall mortality, according 
to WB. It also cuts short many other lives, referred to as DALYs.

All this I am sure you well know, as I have just discovered and read with great interest your online published article"Development Of A Low Smoke 
/Mongolian/Coal Stove, Using A Heterogeneous Testing Protocol".

I have little knowledge of such complex matters, but can follow any clear explanation as is shown by your article. I have also read numerous WB 
reports where they have funded stove projects using their 'Improved MCA Stoves' prior to and up to 2013. These projects actually began as early as 
2002 via ESMAP (UNDP/World Bank Energy Sector Management Assistance Programme). It was in pursuit of follow-up information of this long running saga 
that, following their update in July 2014 it now seems to have faded into obscurity. I say this because the PM only recently announced that all 
previous efforts to resolve the city's ever worsening air pollution had got nowhere, he passing the responsibility to his own scientific researchers 
to come up with a viable solution. It's like starting all over again, after 15 wasted years.

The Mongolian press carries many articles about UB's air problems, largely of public concern for health reasons, but nothing emerges of any activity 
to positively address the problem that has been ongoing since the beginning of the millennium. A UB Post article in 2014 touched on the matter 
claiming that the WB stoves were using the 'wrong' coal, whereby they were meant to use higher quality (anthracite?), but many poorer ger-city 
dwellers were using low quality lignite coal.
http://ubpost.mongolnews.mn/?p=7542

Which brings me to your article that positively asserts and scientifically proves, that properly adapted ELCD stoves can efficiently burn low grade 
coal. Your comment that its flue output is cleaner than the (polluted) ambient air feeding it is nothing short of astonishing. It seems clear that 
your findings and advice were shared by GoM fuel/energy experts then (2011?) involved in researching this very problem, so I am even more confused by 
your disclosures, left to wonder why such simple, low cost adaptations using cheap coal have not been taken up.

Any enlightening information will be appreciated, although I recognise that there may be a much more complex background to the situation than you may 
be able to or wish to provide.  My interest is at a personal level, unconnected with the charity I represent or its work. Either way, I look forward 
to hearing from you.

With very best wishes

Bill Munns
Secretary
www.camda.org.uk


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