[Stoves] Opposition to biomass use in cookstoves.

[Ronal Larson]

List.  Cc Crispin.  (Changing thread title, since I don’t want to emphasize LPG)

	This is to hope we can have some discussion on the site that Crispin has cited below:  http://woodsmokepollution.org/ <http://woodsmokepollution.org/>. 

    	I find this site to be extremely well done - and I know of no site that offers a rebuttal.

	In general I agree with Crispin that the site is very critical about biomass use - but there is a huge bibliography to back up their concern on health issues.  I am inclined to agree that some biomass cooking should be outlawed - having been in a few horribly smoky rural homes.   But is this site overcritical.  Are they wrong for not mentioning pyrolysis and carbon capture?


	I doubt anyone on this list could disprove (I hope they will try) any of these four sentences from this cite they give:  https://www.times-standard.com/2017/08/05/burning-firewood-is-an-airborne-public-health-hazard/ <https://www.times-standard.com/2017/08/05/burning-firewood-is-an-airborne-public-health-hazard/>
	
	   -  "Wood smoke is unique in containing high concentrations of dioxins and PAHs (polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons), probably the most toxic components of air pollution. 
	-  Burning 10 lbs. of wood for one hour releases as many PAHs as 35,000 packs of cigarettes. 
	-  The lifetime cancer risk is 12 times greater for wood smoke compared to an equal volume of secondhand cigarette smoke. 
	-  Toxic free-radical chemicals in wood smoke are biologically active 40 times longer than the free radicals in cigarette smoke"


	So I personally am not trying to make a stove that can negate any of those statistics.  Rather two goals:

		1.  To make the cleanest possible wood-burning stove - in the belief that, because they are least cost, wood-burning cook stoves will be in use for many years.
		2.  To make a stove that takes carbon out of the atmosphere - via biochar. (And happens likely to make money while cooking).  That such a stove can save lives - of an unknown amount.   But still likely to never be as safe as some non-biomass forms of cooking.

	I doubt that any  char-making stoves will ever be as clean as the average LPG stove.  (Saying yes- any single LPG stove can be worse - but not on average)  I think this anti-wood site is acting responsibly.  But I wonder if they would agree that our list has merit?   That in many developing countries, there can be no reasonable expectation to stop using wood for cooking?  That there is merit in any technology that can remove atmospheric carbon?

	What are the thoughts of others - on both our site and the way this site is handling our site's issues.

Ron


> On Jun 22, 2019, at 9:17 PM, Crispin Pemberton-Pigott <crispinpigott at outlook.com> wrote:
> 
> Dear Friends
> 
> Hot on the heels of the Pennsylvania oil refinery fire comes one at an LPG facility in Singapore. My wife and I were looking at huge pall of modernising South of Johorwhere were at the moment. We speculated it was a forest fire in Indonesia. Not so. 
> 
> https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/jurong-fire-jalan-buroh-lpg-chinese-nationals-injured-11651822 <https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/jurong-fire-jalan-buroh-lpg-chinese-nationals-injured-11651822>
> 
> The Singapore fire proves once again that how you burn the fuel determines the emission. There was nothing "clean" about the fuel. The result was a thick, dark, smoky mess. 
> 
> In other news the has been praise heaped on power stations that burn biomass blended with coal (sometimes gasifier first, which is pretty interesting) while 
> 
> http://woodsmokepollution.org/ <http://woodsmokepollution.org/>
> 
> holds that all wood combustion has to be stopped. They have some extraordinary claims, all based on the misconception that bad emissions are inherent in wood such that none should burned. This is a Utah-based organisation whose members believe, apparently, that old wood stoves pollute and that new clean stove produce emissions that are more toxic than the old ones. 
> 
> Gas = good, biomass = bad
> 
> Huh. 
> 
> Regards 
> Crispin in Desaru amid the oil palms (biofuel)
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