[Stoves] New (old) stove policy paper

Thu Jan 2 06:44:28 CST 2020

Ron:

In principle I support the business of charmaking. When and how it can be a
bankable business is my concern; will try when I get a few million dollars
to design and implement a project that is agreeable to a developing
country's finance minister, not to Bill Gates.

You ask " Comments on how this might be modified if using a stove that made
money for the user (and I still can’t think of anything besides charcoal in
that category).  Should governments take special (health, soil, climate,
jobs, balance-of-trade, etc) efforts - different from past stove policy
analyses (because of charcoal)? "

One, stoves can make COOKED FOOD FOR SALE. (I will respond to Teddy
separately.) After all, we are talking of COOK-stoves, not char ovens.
Second, this paper, as I explain below, is academic junk; nobody is ever
going to be able to design a perfect project that academics endorse. Third,
governments SHOULD - but probably WOULD NOT - take special efforts unless
there is an overwhelming case of prioritizing; as you should now know from
the experience of the last 30 years, governments have more important things
to do - including corruption - than entertain rich people's fads. I am by
now pretty convinced that non-contextual promotion of cleaner biomass
cookstoves is a reflection of the lifestyles of the rich and loud making
money off the poor and meek. (Distinct from the contextual design and
promotion
<https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/25129?locale-attribute=en>,
another ESMAP product you should read, bookended with the 1994 paper  by
Barnes, et al.)

I am sorry if my use of the word "fad" offended you. To me, most of the
"published literature" part about poor people's biomass cookstoves is a
fad, a hobby, a horrendous insult to the real work that goes on in making
money count at the end of the pipeline. There are markets for fuels, foods,
stoves, labor, and people grow old, die off, making trade-offs. Mere
professors and advocate activists like GACC, quasi-academics at WHO derive
their income from fads.

But I will use another phrase for your interest now - youthful exuberance.
I am old and cynical. You are young and hopeful.

I hope you agree with the stipulation that "making money" is better defined
as "earning profits", revenue minus costs, howsoever defined.

I also hope you then agree that there are many profitable opportunities,
each with different risk profiles and gestation time.

Then I can give you an opinion on this paper - , Rehfuess, et al. Enablers
and Barriers to Large-Scale Uptake of Improved Solid Fuel Stoves:A
Systematic Review.

1. It is a secondary or tertiary work. None of these people have any direct
experience in design and implementation of investment projects. As they say
" We conducted systematic searches through multidisciplinary databases,
specialist websites, and consulting experts ." This is strikingly different
from the paper you are still reading, by Barnes, et al. Yes, only one
(Robert) of the four authors had actual experience in biomass supplies and
household cookstoves but two others had field experience in the sociology
of energy (Doug) and one in forestry and wood use (Keith). The last one
(Kirk), while an academic, had extensive field experience conducting and
observing research. This, sir, is academic exuberance.

2. Their first conclusion in the Abstract is sophomoric blather: "
Achieving adoption and sustained use of IS at a large scale requires that
all factors, spanning household/community and program/societal levels, be
assessed and supported by policy. " Yeah, right. The logical implication
is, "Nobody can do anything other than churn out academic platitudes." Been
there, done that; decades ago.

3. Their second conclusion in the Abstract  "We propose a planning tool
that would aid this process and suggest further research to incorporate an
evaluation of effectiveness." This is more like an advanced undergraduate's
serious plea for a career. This is what your favorite "published authors"
have done for a lifetime now. Has made no difference other than production
of PhDs by means of PhDs.

THIS, sir, is an ACTUAL EXAMPLE, of "making money with stoves", exploiting
"profitable opportunities" to get rich in the name of the poor. This is
what EPA contractors have done. (World Bank authors like Doug, Keith and
Robert had also made a well-paying careers out of writing review papers but
they were held to a far higher standard of practitioners in energy projects
and policymaking. Most academics are poor excuses for effective
intelligence.)

You are fond of throwing citations rather than researching and debating the
propositions. I pick and choose arguments not because they make me buy
comfortable company among groupthinkers. I do have academic friends whom I
respect and even agree with at times, so let me now pretend to be an
academic peer reviewer for this paper that has already passed the
thresholds of mutual backscratchers:

a. This is a lie adopted by cite-o-logy and groupthink: "In terms of PM10
exposure, HAP can thus be placed somewhere between passive and active
smoking and, unsurprisingly, most of the well-known health effects
associated with tobacco smoking have also been documented for HAP. " There
is no - repeat, no - measure of long-term PM10 exposure from cooking, and
HAP exposures cannot be separated from other PM10 in the first place. (The
Saksena paper referred to has a broken link in the paper. But see "Exposure
Data: Household Use of Solid Fuels and High-temperature Frying."
<https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK385522/ > and find me evidence of
PM10 exposures due to household solid fuels, other sources, for sizable
population and long enough durations to make any policy-relevant finding.)

b. Read this carefully - " Economic modeling suggests that IS use can be a
cost-effective means of reducing the HAP-attributable disease burden" (IS =
Improved Stoves). Modeling can suggest anything that suits the fancy of the
modeler. What is referred to here as "benefit" is reduction in
"HAP-attributable disease burden". Remember, attributions are for
populations at large, and Burden of Disease applies to some 50-55 million
people dying every year and their lifelong exposures to various "risk
factors" for disease and disability. For most of the presumed household
users of solid fuels for cooking and heating, there is simply no recorded
evidence of exposures to HAP for these millions. Since "HAP exposures" is a
lie, the whole edifice of this "economic modeling" is also a lie.

c. Finally, " The validity of the insights gained is fundamentally
determined by the quality of the included studies."  Which is academic
cop-out, a pretense at honesty in order to save one's hide. Also, " Given
the included study designs and their apparent limitations, the majority of
individual study findings should be seen as associations rather than as
causal effects. " Again, honesty that admits impotence.

Now, I do not grudge academics their chosen path to fame and money. Just
that what these authors present after reviewing 57 studies and interviewing
experts is well-known among practitioners for decades. All they say is "Do
more research." I happen to be skeptical of the intent and competence of
arms-length research. I used to like "intervention-based research" and
could still find youthful enthusiasm for it, but no longer for epidemiology
of the Malawi stove studies we have discussed here a couple of years back.
These epidemiological types usually know nothing about the science of
combustion or of environmental risk factors generally (all of which are
contextual) or the lifestyles of the poor and meek, only the lifestyles of
the rich and loud.

N

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nikhil Desai
(US +1) 202 568 5831
*Skype: nikhildesai888*

On Thu, Jan 2, 2020 at 12:48 AM Ronal Larson <rongretlarson at comcast.net>
wrote:

> List with ccs.
>
> I may respond later to some of the following from Nikhil, but I still have
> to read the paper.
>
> I have however just read a similar new-old (2014) paper that I hope others
> will disect/critique (I found it well done).  Disect especially in terms
> that Nikhil calls my “fad" - making money while cooking.  This second paper
> also doesn’t cover money making - but I like the seven main categories (31
> subcategories) they have developed.  Comments on how this might be modified
> if using a stove that made money for the user (and I still can’t think of
> anything besides charcoal in that category).  Should governments take
> special (health, soil, climate, jobs, balance-of-trade, etc) efforts -
> different from past stove policy analyses (because of charcoal)?
> The paper is non-fee and it (and more) is at:
> https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/pdf/10.1289/ehp.1306639.
>
> Ron
>
>
> On Jan 1, 2020, at 8:39 PM, Nikhil Desai <pienergy2008 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Ron:
>
> I am shocked! Shocked!! Tickled! YOU didn't know THIS paper?
>
> I can now call myself an old man of "stoves" work as far as Washington
> policy realm is concerned. You and Crispin are newbies!
>
> It is NOT, in the World Bank terminology, a "policy paper". You read it
> wrong. It is a "technical paper". It does not talk about making money, your
> new fad. And yes, quite a bit has changed in the world, just that this
> paper was a product of a larger exercise whose details  results were never
> published. It has a lot of generalities without context, if I
> remember correctly. It's been 25 years. (No, climate change and CDR haven't
> changed a thing. They are rich folks' diversions, so as to keep failing,
> keep poor people poor while pocketing fees and appearing virtuous.
>
> Nor are all the authors "knowledgeable stove experts". Obviously your
> definition of "stove experts" is elastic and changes with your
> presumptions. These authors merely produced a cover for the large East-West
> Center exercise, probably because Kirk Smith was there at the time.
>
> It was, however, the first review paper issued as a proper World Bank
> report. Earlier, in 1983, Fernando Manibog at the Bank had published a
> review of stove programs in the Annual Review of Energy. And Gerry leach
> had been commissioned to prepare a Household Energy Databook in 1985/6. I
> suggest you look up both. They give an insight as to the "pioneering" work
> that has since dominated the vocabulary; good references.
>
> About this paper "What Makes People Cook with Improved Biomass Stoves?A
> Comparative International Review of Stove Programs - Douglas F. Barnes,
> Keith Openshaw,Kirk R. Smith, and Robert van der Plas "
> <http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/738011468766789505/pdf/multi-page.pdf>:
> I can boast that I knew three of the authors since 1982 and the fourth
> since 1986. Two of them are in Washington still, the other two you know of.
>
> I hadn't known of its planning and drafts. I was in Addis in Nov 1992 and
> then for four months in 1993, when I saw the success of the Jiko adapted to
> Ethiopian cooking and the Mirte mtad being designed and tested with
> different materials. I was struck by the rapid transformation household
> energy markets in Addis - biomass stoves as well as electricity for
> injeras, straight from wood, also sparking off commercialization of
> injeras.
>
> This paper had nothing on it because the research design was set in early
> 1992. From what I recall, Bank clients had begun accepting finance for
> biomass stove programs beginning around 1986; the first proposals might
> have been as far back as 1978/9. There was a need for a review and this
> paper collated findings of tens of projects of various sizes and vintages
> to cook a hotchpotch, which I didn't particularly like. It did not reflect
> the complex realities of stove projects that are remotely directed and
> affected more by Washington bureaucrats' and academics' view of the world
> more than the difficulties of moving money via governments.
>
> My copy of this paper had my scribble on the cover page - "Other People's
> Money!". That's what makes people cook with improved biomass stoves, I
> showed to some authors a few years later when I had an office at the World
> Bank.
>
> My conclusion still remains the same - What makes people cook with
> improved biomass stoves? Other people's money."
>
> The real challenge is, how to make sure that money is used effectively -
> cooks USING the new devices - and not wasted on people who write papers
> without doing the hard work of project implementation. (Only one of these
> authors had that experience.)
>
> Of course, the paper's conclusion in the Abstract still remain valid - "
> Modem, efficient biomass stoves can alleviate some of these problems by
> reducing some householders' cash outlays for fuel, diminishing the time
> others must spend to collect fuel, reducing air pollution, and relieving
> local pressure on wood resources. Yet despite the apparent benefits of
> improved stoves and a recent spate of "dissemination" programs, many
> developing-country households have failed to adopt them. "
>
> Doug will be surprised that I agree with him. But of course, he and I both
> are fans of the word "Modern."
>
> Doug and Keith wrote a book 18 years later - "Cleaner Hearths, Better
> Homes" (Oxford 2012, with Priti Kumar). I criticized it, but find it
> valuable enough to keep it within reach from my desk. This book also has my
> snarky scribble on the inside cover page - "Not clean enough? Not good
> enough?"
>
> But THAT is the crux of my unhappiness with the nonsense of ISO metrics,
> tiers and protocols. If you get away from the silly notion that stove
> designers compete for these ISO ratings, you just might focus your work on
> what the cook finds clean enough and goood enough. The authors' use of the
> words "cleaner" and "better", combined, says everything that a policy and
> project planner needs to know.
>
> Have fun! Please tell us what you discovered in this "old" paper.
>
> N
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Nikhil Desai
> (US +1) 202 568 5831
> *Skype: nikhildesai888*
>
>
>
> On Wed, Jan 1, 2020 at 4:16 PM Ronal Larson <rongretlarson at comcast.net>
> wrote:
>
>> List:
>>
>> I don’t recall this one:
>> http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/738011468766789505/pdf/multi-page.pdf
>> (from 1994 - before TLUDs or other char-making stoves were ever mentioned)
>>
>> One question is - if a stove can make money vs save money - are there new
>> or augmented policy options?
>>
>> Another - has anything really changed in 25 years?  (Certainly climate
>> change and CDR are new.)
>>
>> I haven’t finished reading yet.  But it looks well done - by
>> knowledgeable stove experts.
>>
>> Ron
>>
>> _________________
>>
>
>
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