[Stoves] TLUD stoves and tests

[Xavier Brandao]

Dear Nikhil,

 

The CSI or WHT measure the qualities of the cooking system, and that includes the stove itself (and the vessel).

 

Reliability is nothing more than that: « if I test this stove, within this cooking system « stove + user + vessel + fuel + food », can I trust the lab results to give me good indication on how the stove will operate in real life, with a similar cooking system »?

That’s the minimum requirement.

 

« it is the overall economy of cooking »

Sure, it is this economy which is often difficult to predict and improve i.e. the stove which saves fuel in the lab and wastes fuel in the kitchen.

 

« who cares about performance metrics and tiers that you and Crispin, along with many others, signed off on six or more years ago (Hague or Lima)? »

No one. But everyone cares about what these performance metrics translate. Even the user: « my stove cooks faster, it’s great to prepare breakfast in the morning. » « I need to fetch twice less wood or buy twice less charcoal », « I cough less » etc.

 

« A repeat plea - listen to the cooks who cook meals, not numbers. »

Listening to cooks is what everyone does or tries to do. The hardest part is what comes after. It is easy to say « listen to cooks », but how do you design a stove from there?

Your future customer will say: « I want my new stove to be quicker than my mud stove, with no smoke. I want it to allow to cook big or small quantity of food, and to save wood ».

Once you have listened to a cook, how do you design a stove from there?

Have you already tried to design, build, test, improve a stove Nikhil?

 

I don’t see how a stove can be designed with no numbers and only a wet finger.

 

To test the stove with a wok, there are the CCT and KPT.

In the lab, the WHT and CSI approach seem to make much more sense to me. The customer needs can translate in numbers. You need to cook rice and dhal? But how does it translate in terms of time, power to the pot?

If you say: « I want my smartphone to be responsive and powerful », this translates to numbers for the engineers in the lab. But, of course, you will submit the target-customer to your product, to the experience of it, so he/can can tell you how he/she feels, how the product feels.

 

"How about looking into some more versatile tests that are not limited to a pot of water.  How would we test the efficiency of getting the heat into a wok being used for stir frying?  Perhaps we could use an infrared thermometer to measure the temperature of the food and end the test when it all reaches a temperature that kills bacteria.  How about testing the stove and the cooking vessel separately, so each has its own values?  That would give the consumer a much better preview of both, and more knowledge to pick and choose."

Sure, and it has been said many times that new protocols, more adapted, should be developed if someone feels it is needed.

 

You have tried the CSI and WHT to test a stove + wok used for stir frying, and you think it is not adapted?

Tell exactly what is not adapted, how it could be better, develop your own protocol, and submit it to peer review.

 

Best,



Xavier



 

De : Nikhil Desai [mailto:pienergy2008 at gmail.com] 
Envoyé : mercredi 18 juillet 2018 01:56
À : Xavier Brandao
Cc : Discussion of biomass cooking stoves; Paul Anderson; Kirk H.; Crispin Pemberton-Pigott
Objet : Re: [Stoves] TLUD stoves and tests

 

Xavier:

Nicely put. 

The way I read Kirk H., his complaint is that "these cooking vessel tests .. do not measure the qualities of the stove itself."

You and Crispin seem to be obsessed with "reliability". Of course, reproducibility is a hallmark of science. But my question is, "reliability" of what and why?

There is no reason to worry about fuel or thermal efficiency per se; it is the overall economy of cooking - which no doubt includes costs of food ingredients, water, fuel, vessels, stove, time - that even a supposedly illiterate woman understands and tries to obtain. 

Equally, there is no reason to worry about per minute emission rates unless they are shown to predictably affect exposures, not computed fantasies of air circulation models for closed spaces, one room or two or three. 

So, except for CDM and Gold Standard who rely on fictional CO2 avoidance (and ignore health pollutants), or marketers of HAPIT, who cares about performance metrics and tiers that you and Crispin, along with many others, signed off on six or more years ago (Hague or Lima)?

In that sense, I think Kirk H. has advanced a most valuable and succinct suggestion, even keeping efficiency as a metric - 



 

"How about looking into some more versatile tests that are not limited to a pot of water.  How would we test the efficiency of getting the heat into a wok being used for stir frying?  Perhaps we could use an infrared thermometer to measure the temperature of the food and end the test when it all reaches a temperature that kills bacteria.  How about testing the stove and the cooking vessel separately, so each has its own values?  That would give the consumer a much better preview of both, and more knowledge to pick and choose."


Amen. This is complicated but a step toward realism. Different fuels and meals can provide additional variation. 

The ProPublica piece is junk journalism, another trip report from poverty tourism. I think a new thinking can start with a modest acknowledgement that a cookstove is for cooking, that performance metrics may only be defined in the context of a"service standard" (actions such as boil, steam, wok fry, deep fry, roast, and major meal types that cover most of these actions and employ different vessels) and of public policy (i.e., non-cooking - e.g., air quality improvement).

A repeat plea - listen to the cooks who cook meals, not numbers.

Reading the Indonesia pilot report yesterday, I remember an analogy with Indonesia Solar Home Systems project, which became a template for many other SHS projects. For bulk procurement under the rules of competitive bidding, entire systems were specified; this led to one disaster after another. Under the SHS projects, components had to comply with standards, but retailers were free to design the 35Wp, 50Wp SHS and after-sales service pitch customized to their target customers.

Just maybe, this Indonesia cookstove pilot has created a template to promote customer-centric design and subsidy scheme unlike anything EPA had in mind in setting off the ISO exercise. 

Nikhil




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Skype: nikhildesai888

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