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The gas industry is paying Instagram influencers to gush over gas stoves (2020)

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Re: The gas industry is paying Instagram influencers to gush over gas stoves (2020)

#71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I open the window and turn on the extractor fan when I use my gas hob. Good. One of the possible interventions is to make ventillation a building code requirement.

Isn't this just a requirement for a kitchen? You cannot fry indoors without ventilation unless you enjoy choking on smoke. Neither can you boil indoors without ventilation unless you enjoy coating everything in the room with moisture. The combustion of a gas stove IME is a smaller contributor to ventilation requirements than both of the above. Maybe the moisture one is less relevant in low humidity environments like…

> Isn't this just a requirement for a kitchen?

Not in the US at the federal level. Some states have code requirements about it. My house lacks one, which is annoying when I'm searing steaks, and I plan to rectify it when we redo the kitchen.

Re: The gas industry is paying Instagram influencers to gush over gas stoves (2020)

#73
post #58
post #49

The respiratory argument I really don't understand with specific regard to gas vs electric cooking. I don't care if my range is powered by alien technology that magically sequesters carbon somewhere else - When you heat something above a certain temperature, you are producing all kinds of chemical compounds that are not going to be good for you. It doesn't really matter how the mass was brought to that temperature. T…

I don't know the numbers, but the premise here is not (a) that gas is bad or that (b) cooking releases particulate, but rather that gas stoves are actually constantly leaking very small amounts of particulate that in aggregate can cause harm along the same lines of other sources of PM2.5 pollution.

Gas stoves might be constantly leaking, but they only produce particulates when they are alight. Assuming you don't have an ancient appliance with a pilot light.

Re: The gas industry is paying Instagram influencers to gush over gas stoves (2020)

#74

Induction maaaan! Switched from gas to induction and love it. I miss my stove every time i have to cook elsewhere. Mine is pretty much the cheapest induction range on the market (and i bought it used). Heats up way faster than gas (WAY FASTER, will get cast iron glowing if i leave an empty cast iron on the stove for a while at the highest setting), low/medium control is excellent and precise, and i really appreciate…

I have envy. I'm only one year into my second home with a gas range and I'm over it. It has excellent control (compared to traditional electric), however I find the rest of it frustrating. Any grease splatter and I'm removing and cleaning grates, surfaces, and caps. There are burners that are slower to light than others, so I'm regularly fiddling with cleaning out the orifices.

I'll consider moving to induction after I get my electrical panel upgraded.

Re: The gas industry is paying Instagram influencers to gush over gas stoves (2020)

#75
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? The reason people have been talking about stopping use of gas stoves is that they put out pollution inside people's homes, which is pretty separate from the overall dialogue about fossil fuels or how to heat homes.

Since when is there pollution inside homes from gas stoves? How have all of the millions of gas stove users been cooking multiple meals with them on a daily basis and nobody noticed this supposed pollution?

https://oem.bmj.com/content/60/10/759

There's an article from 2003 so this isn't exactly new.

Re: The gas industry is paying Instagram influencers to gush over gas stoves (2020)

#76

Induction maaaan! Switched from gas to induction and love it. I miss my stove every time i have to cook elsewhere. Mine is pretty much the cheapest induction range on the market (and i bought it used). Heats up way faster than gas (WAY FASTER, will get cast iron glowing if i leave an empty cast iron on the stove for a while at the highest setting), low/medium control is excellent and precise, and i really appreciate…

I've not had one myself but all my friends are so hung up on some annoying details of most induction stoves that I am kinda ok with my old normal electric one (never had gas, it's not very common around here). Details include: The touch screen not reacting well, esp if you spilled something, a magnetic fob to enable it and no way to properly store it, insane cost should you drop something and damage it (ok, that one's far-fetched)...

Re: The gas industry is paying Instagram influencers to gush over gas stoves (2020)

#77
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The makers of high power battery stoves maybe? For those who don't know these are stoves that have on board batteries allowing them to generate, for a period of time, far more heat than an ordinary house circuit would be able to power. This replicates some of the advantages of gas. But honestly I think the ban gas stoves thing is brought to you by the same people who gave us bans on plastic straws. "Let's maximally i…

I don't think this is similar to the plastic straws at all. The focus for banning gas stoves is on the (respiratory) health issues associated with gas cooking of the household. It is not about climate change.

So says the climate change institute who funded the study.

The real reason seems to be elsewhere: people care about cooking with gas, but they use gas heaters if they have gas. If you can stop people from cooking with gas, you can switch entire houses to electric more quickly.

Re: The gas industry is paying Instagram influencers to gush over gas stoves (2020)

#78

Who is pushing to ban gas stoves? First it was adding catalytic converters in cars, then regulating tobacco, banning asbestos, removing contaminants from drinking water. It never stops. This is nothing more than one more rung in a decades long campaign of using the democratic process to hold companies accountable for pollutants and slowly improve the health and well-being of millions of Americans. Sure, air is cleane…

The president is pushing this

No he isnt.

Re: The gas industry is paying Instagram influencers to gush over gas stoves (2020)

#79
post #49

The respiratory argument I really don't understand with specific regard to gas vs electric cooking. I don't care if my range is powered by alien technology that magically sequesters carbon somewhere else - When you heat something above a certain temperature, you are producing all kinds of chemical compounds that are not going to be good for you. It doesn't really matter how the mass was brought to that temperature. T…

I don’t think that’s true. The worry is the NOx emissions (that is a combustion product from the foams, not from cooking), the amount being produced by gas stoves which was previously under-appreciated until recently.

Studies I’ve seen indicate that most domestic rangehoods (apart from the very high end ones) are not sufficient to effectively remove these gas combustion products.

Re: The gas industry is paying Instagram influencers to gush over gas stoves (2020)

#80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to push people away from gas heating, just tax the shit out of gas. No household uses enough gas for cooking that it would matter that much to them. (We cook a fair amount and heat domestic water with gas. In the summer, our bills are around $30/mo, including about $12 in fixed charges. Quadruple the usage charges [add a 300% tax], and if I want to cook with gas, I still will, but I sure as hell will get…

Two things: - That would have an immediate financial impact on people with gas boilers in a way that banning new gas appliances does not. This kind of thing would need to be rolled out very slowly over time if you want to avoid extreme backlash. Constraints on new construction don't have the same effects. (EDIT: Ah, you edited your comment to address this one - sure, if you can reliably distribute funds for lower-inc…

I just installed a new gas boiler (I wanted to go electric but it was massively economically disadvantageous). That thing is probably going to run for 20 years. If you have patience to wait a handful of decades, attacking gas stoves and waiting for trickle-up in consumer preferences to happen could be a good play. If you want faster change, tax and rebate is probably a better plan.

Utilities already have the means to bill and tax fuel. Most already have conservation rebate schemes in place. Many already have low-income billing plans and rate cards (probably all have multiple rate cards). I think you could reliably administer a tax, rebate, and capital credit scheme using mostly existing mechanisms.

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