<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_extra"><div class="gmail_quote"><div><br></div><div><div class="gmail-adn gmail-ads" style="padding-left:4px;font-size:medium"><div class="gmail-gs" style="margin-left:30px"><div class="gmail-hq gmail-gt gmail-a10" id="gmail-:8od" style="font-size:12.8px"><div class="gmail-a3I">Attachments area</div><div id="gmail-:8ob"></div><div class="gmail-aQH" id="gmail-:8o3"><div class="gmail-aZK"></div></div></div><div class="gmail-hi"></div></div><div class="gmail-ajx"></div></div><div class="gmail-gA gmail-gt gmail-acV" style="font-size:12.8px;background-image:initial;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);border-bottom-left-radius:0px;border-bottom-right-radius:0px;border-top:none"><div class="gmail-gB gmail-xu"><div class="gmail-ip gmail-iq" style="margin-right:5px;padding-top:8px;padding-right:0px;padding-left:4px;border-top:1px solid rgb(216,216,216)"></div></div></div><br>Dear Ron: <br><br>I beg your pardon. I have no "anti-stove development" agenda. It is people like Marc Gunther, or that UN official (I mean a real one, not the fake one at 1750 Penn I used to frequent so much) quoted by Xavier a few months ago, or even GACC, who have been disappointed with the 40+ years of "stove development" by -- well, just who I wonder. <br><br>I already replied to your itemized summary of anti-Nikhil rant. I haven't yet seen the details you promised on my "at least 28" sins you promised three days ago; please tell us what you find so unprofessional and what your counter-propositions would be. <br><br>For now, let me respond to your post below from two days ago. <br><br>All I see is "cite-o-logy", the disease that corrupts science. One cannot get away with providing references without at the same time making some statements about what those citations mean and how. <br><br>So, please state your propositions. What do you intend to tell us - that there are citations outside this list to read up which you haven't read yourself? <br><br></div></div></div><blockquote style="margin:0px 0px 0px 40px;border:none;padding:0px"><div class="gmail_extra"><div class="gmail_quote"><div>A. <b>DALYs</b>: I don't think I ever said all DALYs are bogus numbers, but coming to think of it, yes. They are. Just go back and read my post a few months ago on the "super-human" adventures of the GoBbleDygood that is GBD. To repeat, GBD is "killing by assumptions". In the words of one of the principals, they "got away with murder". All I am saying is that they are still getting away with murder. If you have doubts, also please read up the WHO Director's plea for "better data". Fancy models with cooked up "data" are a waste of time and money. Keeping PhDs employed has no inherent value; Keynesian that I am, I would rather have some of them dig holes and refill them. </div></div></div></blockquote><div class="gmail_extra"><div class="gmail_quote"><div><br></div></div></div><blockquote style="margin:0px 0px 0px 40px;border:none;padding:0px"><div class="gmail_extra"><div class="gmail_quote"><div>B. <b>BAMG </b>Webinar: But that is science - dig holes, check, refill them, dig new ones. I did suffer through the "fake classroom" we now call "Webinar" - with Michael Johnson and Ajay Pillarisetti - you wanted us all to attend. I have some notes somewhere, but the take-away was Johnson's frank admission about the extremely simplifying assumptions that have to be made to use HAPIt and churn out numbers. Of course, simplifying assumptions are necessary to propose a model, but if the assumptions have no - repeat, no - basis in empirical observations, we get a farce, not science. No matter how many adherents choose to become blind so they can also make money writing news stories on elephants. (I did meet some people from BAMG around the time it was formed, I think 10+ years ago. I am not at all accusing Johnson and Pillarisetti of blindness. They are honest in describing what they do. I even read up Ajay's PhD thesis a few months ago.)<br><br></div></div></div></blockquote><blockquote style="margin:0px 0px 0px 40px;border:none;padding:0px"><div class="gmail_extra"><div class="gmail_quote">C. <b>Use of coal</b>: The WHO link you <a href="http://www.who.int/indoorair/guidelines/hhfc/recommendation_3/en/">cite</a> says '"<span style="color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px">Unprocessed coal* should not be used as a household fuel." There is a WHO-Europe 2015 report says "</span><span style="font-size:12.8px">"</span><u style="font-size:12.8px"><span class="gmail-il">WHO</span> currently makes no recommendation about the residential use of processed coal but calls for future research</u><span style="font-size:12.8px"> to examine the content of, emissions from and exposure to pollutants – including toxic contaminants – from the use of “clean” or “smokeless” coal."</span><span style="font-size:13px;color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:helvetica,arial,sans-serif"> (</span><a href="http://www.euro.who.int/__data/assets/pdf_file/0009/271836/ResidentialHeatingWoodCoalHealthImpacts.pdf" target="_blank" style="font-size:12.8px">Residential heating with wood and coal:health impacts and policy options in <span class="gmail-il">Europe</span> and North America</a><span style="font-size:12.8px"> </span><span style="font-size:12.8px"> Authors include </span><span class="gmail-il" style="font-size:12.8px">Zoe</span><span style="font-size:12.8px"> Chafe and Kirk </span><span class="gmail-il" style="font-size:12.8px">Smith</span><span style="font-size:12.8px">. Emphasis added). Even this is patently misleading -- the degree of processing matters only to the extent that it affects the quality of combustion. If unprocessed coal - or wood - combusted with the right equipment can achieve very low levels of PICs, it can be better than processed coal or wood combusted badly. This is basic combustion science; I can give you citations if you wish. EMISSIONS ARE NOT A PROPERTY OF THE FUEL; THEY ARE A RESULT OF FUEL CHEMISTRY, COMBUSTION PRACTICES. (Besides, emissions do not automatically lead to exposures unless you cook up the right equations for right "boxes". Please ask Michael Johnson. I don't think much of his model, but then I rarely think much of anybody's models. Doesn't mean the modelers are dumb; others are.) <br><br>D. <b>IERs</b>: Please read my posts on this list about EPA's PM2.5 theology and Burnett et al. (2014). For EPA, "absence of evidence is evidence of absence" -- and deception (they need to assume equitoxicity because now that they have regulated SO2 exposures out, they have to BLAME EVERYTHING, no matter what the known toxicity levels. As for IERs, my post quotes the reservations of the authors. If you don't accept those reservations, write to them. (IER has now been extended from a single study of limited duration in some parts of one country to at least 67 studies. The basic criticism stands -- "relative risk" refers to attribution, not causality. Of course, millions and millions of dollars have to be spent further to keep this exercise going on and on and on.) <br><br>E. <b>The 20% solution</b>: At last. I see you make one assertion -- "</span>This graph from about 20% through the Ppt is key to our stove work." Please elaborate. What does this graph say? What do the numbers on the horizontal axis - micrograms per cubic meter - mean? Concentrations or exposures? Where? (Can't be labs because pneumonia cannot be generated in labs.) What does "relative risk" on the vertical axis imply? (My view, which I suspect Prof. Smith may agree to: a) This graph has no predictive power for disease incidence in any particular population, leave alone for individuals; b) Nor does it have any specific policy relevance other than to opine that LPG cooking is probably safer as far as emissions go, though immediate, actual deaths due to fires may be far higher in some regions. Just look up reports on actual deaths instead of concocted "premature deaths".) <br><br></div></div></blockquote><div class="gmail_extra"><div class="gmail_quote"><div>I admit to naughtiness here - you only meant 20% as in "20% down the presentation"; the precise number for those who care is 23% in a file of 50 pages. <br><br>Could it be that you just raced down the presentation to find something you felt salvaged your own "stove development" agenda, ignoring all else? <br><br>After all, Prof. Smith speaks of stove development problem as "a very large technical challenge to
solid fuels to reach 99% or greater
reductions over open fires".<br><br>I don't agree with Prof. Smith on that. It is not some ISO IWA claptrap of boiling water in labs that will determine percentage reductions. (Compared to what baseline? Not all solid fuels are the same, and not all of them are cooked over open fires. The whole "stoves and health impacts" propaganda of GBD, of which Prof. Smith is now unfortunately a part, is based on -- um, I have said that before, so I won't be naughty again.) What matters is not fuels or emission rates but emission loads, concentrations, and above all, exposures. I will write about that in another post. I happen to think coals are much better fuel to tinker with than generic "biomass". Everything has a context; labs and computers are not context, not to me at any rate. <br><br>For now, please - you and all others - read <a href="http://www.caravanmagazine.in/reportage/smoke-india-perfect-cookstove">Up in Smoke</a>. <br><br>While Neros played fiddle, "The cleanest models have been disseminated to
only a few 100s of thousands of households." (Prof. Smith again, lest you accuse me of insulting your intelligence.) </div><div><br></div><div>You ask members of this list "to decide whether Nikhil and Crispin are better authorities on the topic of this exchange than the cites above." <br><br>I will let Crispin speak for himself. Whatever gave you the idea that I claim to be an authority? Perish the thought!! You think I - who am not ready to kowtow to any "authority", including WHO (because buried in WHO bowels are inconvenient truths, as is the case with GoBbleDygook) - will not make fun of myself?? <br><br>Come on, friend. Have some fun. Do some reading. Don't throw citations and please don't insult the intelligence of list members by asking them to decide on the basis of throwing citations. That would mean mortgaging the brains. (GACC will extend loans to those who are ready to do so). <br><br>Nikhil<br> <br>(*) I have know Prof. Smith's work since 1981, soon after he landed at Delhi airport with the monitoring equipment pictured in slides 21 and 22 of the presentation you cite. You may notice the absence of visible smoke in slide 21. :-) <br><br><br><br><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
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Message: 1<br>
Date: Thu, 8 Dec 2016 16:00:05 -0700<br>
From: Ronal W. Larson <<a href="mailto:rongretlarson@comcast.net">rongretlarson@comcast.net</a>><br>
To: Discussion of biomass <<a href="mailto:stoves@lists.bioenergylists.org">stoves@lists.bioenergylists.<wbr>org</a>><br>
Cc: Traveller <<a href="mailto:miata98@gmail.com">miata98@gmail.com</a>>, Crispin Pemberton-Pigott<br>
<<a href="mailto:crispinpigott@outlook.com">crispinpigott@outlook.com</a>><br>
Subject: Re: [Stoves] report with dissapointing results from cleaner<br>
cookstoves (Crispin)<br>
Message-ID: <<a href="mailto:CD1C366F-D55E-4EDE-9EC6-D2AF28C46AD5@comcast.net">CD1C366F-D55E-4EDE-9EC6-<wbr>D2AF28C46AD5@comcast.net</a>><br>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"<br>
<br>
List cc Crispin and Nikhil:<br>
<br>
Looks like another dreary day and night. Sigh. Before addressing the places where my name appears below, I first have to work on completing last night?s response to Nikhil.<br>
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What I see below are two stove ?experts? - saying that those dealing with the health aspects of stoves are doing it all wrong. But the good news is that we are talking about stoves finally. I will try to explain tomorrow why their following exchange makes no sense. (and I suppose there will be another half dozen messages by then on this topic - as happened on the one I am going to).<br>
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I hope those interested in this ongoing health topic will go back and read an exchange between Nikhil and myself in September. <a href="http://lists.bioenergylists.org/pipermail/stoves_lists.bioenergylists.org/2016-September/012166.html" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://lists.bioenergylists.<wbr>org/pipermail/stoves_lists.<wbr>bioenergylists.org/2016-<wbr>September/012166.html</a> <<a href="http://lists.bioenergylists.org/pipermail/stoves_lists.bioenergylists.org/2016-September/012166.html" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://lists.bioenergylists.<wbr>org/pipermail/stoves_lists.<wbr>bioenergylists.org/2016-<wbr>September/012166.html</a>> That older message strongly relates to this new set below.<br>
<br>
To read the following exchanges you need these further explanations:<br>
<br>
DALY and ADALY (respectively in years and $) are many places below, but a simple start is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disability-adjusted_life_year" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/<wbr>Disability-adjusted_life_year</a> <<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disability-adjusted_life_year" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">https://en.wikipedia.org/<wbr>wiki/Disability-adjusted_life_<wbr>year</a>> . I encourage all readers to decide if these are valid units - and if not what should replace them. Nikhil says they are bogus numbers<br>
<br>
WHO = World Health Organization; they sponsored a webinar featuring Dr. Michael Johnson - who developed a nice model disparaged (above) by Nikhil. I believe some of the failure to see large health effects in the other thread we are talking about is contained in Michael?s modeling. The particular webinar with Dr. Johnson is saved at <a href="http://www.pciaonline.org/webinars" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.pciaonline.org/<wbr>webinars</a> <<a href="http://www.pciaonline.org/webinars" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.pciaonline.org/<wbr>webinars</a>> (Thanks to the folks maintaining this older work.)<br>
<br>
<a href="http://www.who.int/indoorair/guidelines/hhfc/recommendation_3/en/" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.who.int/indoorair/<wbr>guidelines/hhfc/<wbr>recommendation_3/en/</a> <<a href="http://www.who.int/indoorair/guidelines/hhfc/recommendation_3/en/" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.who.int/indoorair/<wbr>guidelines/hhfc/<wbr>recommendation_3/en/</a>> explains why NOT to use coal as a fuel (this re a topic raised in the exchange below)<br>
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IWA is explained at <a href="http://cleancookstoves.org/technology-and-fuels/standards/iwa-tiers-of-performance.html" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://cleancookstoves.org/<wbr>technology-and-fuels/<wbr>standards/iwa-tiers-of-<wbr>performance.html</a> <<a href="http://cleancookstoves.org/technology-and-fuels/standards/iwa-tiers-of-performance.html" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://cleancookstoves.org/<wbr>technology-and-fuels/<wbr>standards/iwa-tiers-of-<wbr>performance.html</a>><br>
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GBD = Global Burden of Disease; see <a href="http://thelancet.com/gbd" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://thelancet.com/gbd</a> <<a href="http://thelancet.com/gbd" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://thelancet.com/gbd</a>><br>
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IER= Integrated Exposure Response <a href="http://www.who.int/phe/health_topics/outdoorair/databases/AAP_BoD_methods_March2014.pdf" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.who.int/phe/health_<wbr>topics/outdoorair/databases/<wbr>AAP_BoD_methods_March2014.pdf</a> <<a href="http://www.who.int/phe/health_topics/outdoorair/databases/AAP_BoD_methods_March2014.pdf" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.who.int/phe/<wbr>health_topics/outdoorair/<wbr>databases/AAP_BoD_methods_<wbr>March2014.pdf</a>><br>
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I am only a beginner (and expect to stay that way) on this part of stove science. I suggest the task of this list?s members is to decide whether Nikhil and Crispin are better authorities on the topic of this exchange than the cites above. Everyone is welcome to trust Nikhil and Crispin on these matters, but I tend to trust the stove side of all this presented by Prof. Kirk Smith of UC-Berkeley - who I believe would not agree with much of their below exchange. See <a href="http://static.squarespace.com/static/53856e1ee4b00c6f1fc1f602/538570c1e4b071a53f15e518/538570d9e4b071a53f15e9cc/1401254105672/DFID-SE4.pdf?format=original" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://static.squarespace.com/<wbr>static/<wbr>53856e1ee4b00c6f1fc1f602/<wbr>538570c1e4b071a53f15e518/<wbr>538570d9e4b071a53f15e9cc/<wbr>1401254105672/DFID-SE4.pdf?<wbr>format=original</a> <<a href="http://static.squarespace.com/static/53856e1ee4b00c6f1fc1f602/538570c1e4b071a53f15e518/538570d9e4b071a53f15e9cc/1401254105672/DFID-SE4.pdf?format=original" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://static.squarespace.<wbr>com/static/<wbr>53856e1ee4b00c6f1fc1f602/<wbr>538570c1e4b071a53f15e518/<wbr>538570d9e4b071a53f15e9cc/<wbr>1401254105672/DFID-SE4.pdf?<wbr>format=original</a>><br>
<br>
This graph from about 20% through the Ppt is key to our stove work. I am now checking whether it likely that any stove (likely to be a TLUD) can get to the WHO-desired 10 ug/m3 (without a chimney). Anyone know?<br>
</blockquote></div></div></div>