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I've seen several articles recently highlighting problems with gas stoves. Some of these are environmental critiques--gas needs to be retired to deal with clima
by gxqoz 5y ago
I've seen several articles recently highlighting problems with gas stoves. Some of these are environmental critiques--gas needs to be retired to deal with climate change. Another critique is around indoor air quality:
"On the air-quality front, at least, the evidence against gas stoves is damning. Although cooking food on any stove produces particulate pollutants, burning gas produces nitrogen dioxide, or NO2,, and sometimes also carbon monoxide, according to Brett Singer, a scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who studies indoor air quality. Brief exposures to air with high concentrations of NO2 can lead to coughing and wheezing for people with asthma or other respiratory issues, and prolonged exposure to the gas can contribute to the development of those conditions, according to the EPA. Homes with gas stoves can contain approximately 50 to 400 percent higher concentrations of NO2 than homes with electric stoves, often resulting in levels of indoor air pollution that would be illegal outdoors, according to a recent report by the Rocky Mountain Institute, a sustainability think tank. “NO2 is invisible and odorless, which is one of the reasons it’s gone so unnoticed,” Brady Seals, a lead author on the report, says."
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2020/10/gas-stoves-are-bad-you-and-environment/616700/ https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2020/10/gas-stov...
- analyte123 5y agoIndoor air pollution is only a serious problem for unvented gas stoves. Current building codes require venting for gas stoves and any gas stove installed in the 21st century will have a vent.
- lozenge 5y agoPeople don't always use the vent.
- cwkoss 5y agoVents should turn on automatically while the burner is ignited and for some amount of time after.
- majormajor 5y agoThat would be nice, and maybe brand-new places are doing that, but across 10+ apartments with gas stoves I've rented in the past 15-odd years, none of them have done that.
- cwkoss 5y agoMe neither. I have an induction burner and would still love this feature on my vent - particularly for smoky steaks or oil fumes - sometimes I forget to turn it on/off. I think an IR thermometer that activates the vent whenever the cooktop is over ~115F would accomplish this pretty well, provided the switch had a manual override to force it on if the sensor fails. A quick search indicates they do exist on some pricier models. I suppose there could be edge cases where the vent could make a stove fire worse by increasing airflow - wonder if these 'smart' vents have logic to handle these cases.
- eigenhombre 5y agoI personally have never seen this happen on any gas stove I've been around (US Midwest mostly).
- pat2man 5y agoPeople don’t even know they are supposed to use the vent.
- kingnothing 5y agoMany (most?) vents do not vent outdoors; they are attached to the microwave and simply move hot air from below the microwave to above it. It's still a major problem.
- andiareso 5y agoSource? In Minnesota at least, I've lived in 5 houses between the years 80s to 2010s that all had external venting with gas stove tops (no remodels). Our new house we are building also is required to have external venting due to code. I know states have individual requirements, but in Minnesota it is required to exhaust to external air. https://up.codes/viewer/minnesota/mn-mechanical-code-2015/chapter/5/exhaust-systems#502.1 https://up.codes/viewer/minnesota/mn-mechanical-code-2015/ch... [EDIT] Code is from 2015 so at least since then.
- bagacrap 5y agopeople I've lived with have refused to use the vent due to the noise it produces
- underbluewaters 5y agoAll indoor cooking requires venting outdoors to be safe. The air quality concerns over gas stoves are a disingenuous argument to push for change for climate mitigation reasons. Most pollution from cooking is related to burning food not fuel, and electric burners make it far easier to burn food. Rather than pushing think tank pieces environmental groups should push the industry to create induction ranges that are 1) cheaper and 2) don't create high frequency noise pollution. Current technology has a lot of positive aspects but the high-pitch buzzing is a deal breaker.
- sparrc 5y agoAre you sure about that? If I boil water in my kitchen on my gas stove the CO2 and VOC levels in our living area nearly triple within 15 minutes of using the stove without burning any food. If I use the electric kettle there's obviously zero change in air quality.
- chaud 5y agoHow are you measuring those levels? I haven't come across a great sensor for CO2 that isn't expensive and needs weekly calibration.
- sparrc 5y agoI use airthings wave. Seems to be fairly accurate as far as I can tell. Whenever I open the windows the CO2 level drops down fairly close to the atmospheric CO2.
- gxqoz 5y agoBased on another recent article, my impression is that indoor air pollution in general is severely understudied. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/04/08/the-hidden-air-pollution-in-our-homes https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/04/08/the-hidden-air...
- swader999 5y agoYou'll be repainting your ceiling every few years.