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How bad is my gas stove?

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Re: How bad is my gas stove?

#521

Post by randyrand »

clusterfish wrote: post #122

Apparently unpopular opinion: despite growing up with gas stoves and cooking every day I do not find them any better at it than decent electric ones (not talking about induction). Granted, my kitchen is not Michelin rated, but I have no idea what fancy temperature control people are constantly raving over with gas. Electric has a bit of thernal inertia, yes. If you cooked more than a few times on your own, you know w…

the thing that annoys me most about my crappy electric is that it only has 2 power levels, on and off, and duty cycles them at a really slow rate (upwards of a minute) for other power levels.

The temperature is all over the map.

I had to simmer something at 180F and it took me 30 minutes to find the right power setting and a big pot of water to stabilize the temperature.

Re: How bad is my gas stove?

#522

Post by ashtonkem »

adrianN wrote: post #284
ashtonkem wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You need to factor in the fact that in many areas natural gas is literally a waste byproduct of the oil extraction process, which is why it’s cheap enough for us to cook with. It’s not just that we would need to make methane at 70% efficiency, it’s that we’d be transitioning from something that’s artificially cheap to something that must be made special purpose just for cooking right as alternatives are getting cheap…

I argue that the price for fuel essentially doesn't matter because you don't need all that much. Electricity costs a couple of cents per kWh, so it's very unlikely that synthetic Methane will cost more than a few dozen cents per kWh. So you can run a stove for an hour a day for one or two bucks or so. I guess that's several times more than you pay for natural gas, but a lot cheaper than going to a restaurant.

I think you’ve got this completely backwards.

> so it's very unlikely that synthetic Methane will cost more than a few dozen cents per kWh

No, it’ll cost much more than that. You’re ignoring the factored in cost of storing and distributing gas. This is something that’s only affordable because of economies of scale (and government support) because it was the only practical option for heating and hot water for a while. As electricity gets cheaper and people switch over to heat pumps and electric hot water heaters, the cost of that distribution network is going to fall on fewer people, driving up their cost.

I wouldn’t be surprised if that the gas bill for synthetic methane just for cooking was as high as your current gas bill for heating and cooking. Once economies of scale go away, things get costly fast.

> So you can run a stove for an hour a day for one or two bucks or so. I guess that's several times more than you pay for natural gas, but a lot cheaper than going to a restaurant.

Sure. But the competitor to a natural gas stove isn’t eating out, it’s electricity. Especially as gas gets more expensive and induction ranges become the norm.

Re: How bad is my gas stove?

#523

Post by selimthegrim »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #488
selimthegrim wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here in New Orleans they take your meter if you report a leak and you can’t get it back for a couple weeks and thousands in reconnection fees because they don’t trust people’s plumbers apparently and have to reinspect everything themselves

> and thousands in reconnection fees because they don’t trust people’s plumbers apparently and have to reinspect everything themselves That makes my regulatory capture spidey senses tingle in several different ways.

The New Orleans City Council regulates them, not the state. Not sure if the city Building and Permits office (which has had its own travails) gets involved in this.

Re: How bad is my gas stove?

#524

Post by gibbonsrcool »

topaz0 wrote: post #516
gibbonsrcool wrote: post #484

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is an implicit comparison through the research he cites. It’s also almost certain the reader would be using this information to decide on moving away from gas. No one is trying to use this information to make a decision on whether to abandon cooking. They want to know how bad gas stoves pollute indoor air so they can weigh their decision to go electric.

Sure. But the comment you responded to was about the observational study that the author did, not about the research. The question is about what portion of the observed emissions come from cooking per se, as opposed to the gas that is used to do the cooking. I suspect it is a small portion, but it is still an interesting one, and not addressed by the article.

My original comment was saying that when trying to make comparisons between types of stoves food emissions are controlled.

Re: How bad is my gas stove?

#525

Post by BenjiWiebe »

lumb63 wrote: post #171
forty wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love induction and I hate gas. But aren't there possible effects of induction on health?

EMFs (such as from induction cooktops) absolutely have an impact on health. A study I cited in another comment indicates that a compliant induction cooktop emits 16x the amount on non-ionizing radiation that’s considered safe.

At what frequency? At lower frequencies, you can go higher power, as more of the radiation passes through you instead of warming you up.

Re: How bad is my gas stove?

#526

Post by jtbayly »

gibbonsrcool wrote: post #524
topaz0 wrote: post #516

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. But the comment you responded to was about the observational study that the author did, not about the research. The question is about what portion of the observed emissions come from cooking per se, as opposed to the gas that is used to do the cooking. I suspect it is a small portion, but it is still an interesting one, and not addressed by the article.

My original comment was saying that when trying to make comparisons between types of stoves food emissions are controlled.

And that comparison hasn’t been made. Sure. The food emissions are going to be (about) the same for the same meal, regardless of the stove. But nobody knows whether the food emissions make up 5% or 95% of the emissions in his measurements. Because he hasn’t compared his gas stove to any other stove.

Re: How bad is my gas stove?

#527

Post by rsynnott »

vba616 wrote: post #503
rsynnott wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly, this is more or less the opposite to Europe these days. While integrated stove/ovens are somewhat rare now, they tend to exist almost exclusively on the high end; a bog-standard cheapest-possible installation will be a separate halogen or induction (or gas) stovetop and a single oven.

>a separate halogen or induction (or gas) stovetop Are you implying resistive coils, like Calrod, are more expensive, or not available?

You never see the naked coils anymore; as far as I know they're not available anymore (though I'm not sure _why_; they were definitely a thing when I was a kid, but I haven't seen one in about 25 years). The very cheapest units are often those solid plate resistive heater things, but the price difference between those and halogen/ceramic units is very small (about 50 euro on the low end) and the running costs are higher; you don't see them much anymore.

Interestingly, there _is_ still a market for the halogen ones, even though induction units are about the same price on the low end: https://powercity.ie/groups/view?grp=45&class=41

Re: How bad is my gas stove?

#528

Post by carterschonwald »

amluto wrote: post #243
samwillis wrote: post #110

To anyone considering switching to an induction hob and hearing anecdotal stories of how some people don’t think they are “as hot” or “slower” than gas. I guarantee these are all related to the pans being used. It is of upmost importance that you get a really good set of pans “designed” for induction. We have found “tri-ply” stainless steel pans work really well, better than on gas. Cast iron is also brilliant, I inh…

I recently bought a Polyscience/Breville Control Freak, and I’m increasingly convinced this is the future. It heats dramatically faster than a supposedly high end gas stove I compared it to despite being a lowly 1.6kW or so device. (Gas stoves are stupendously inefficient. That 15kBTU/hr stove may well deliver 15kBTU/hr to the air but not to your pan.). It heats quite evenly. And best of all, it has closed loop tempe…

Does it have a coil whine? Cheaper table top induction coolers have a painful whine for me
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