15 ms·
My best estimate is gas stoves decrease life expectancy by 53 days on average
- giantg2 5y agoI wonder how many days of your life you save by having the water boil sooner (life is 53 days shorter, but you spent X days less waiting for things to boil).
- wikibob 5y agoWater boils faster with an induction stove than with gas.
- changoplatanero 5y agodoes gas really boil faster than induction? i remember electric stoves being really slow but induction is not the same
- colechristensen 5y agoDepends on your burners, either could win but generally induction has higher power to the pan than gas.
- ZetaZero 5y agoThe water will boil faster if you don't watch the pot.
- com2kid 5y agoInduction stoves heat water far faster than gas stoves do. My gas stove is so slow to heat water (even with its largest burner) that I have a separate electric kettle I use to heat up a liter of water and then I put that into a pot on the stove, useful when I want to steam something.
- quasarj 5y agoThis is absolutely not my experience. Can you share what induction stove you're using that's so great?
- com2kid 5y agohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcAJ3_-Hou8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcAJ3_-Hou8 - Great coverage of this entire issue https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjRcEwLGtV8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjRcEwLGtV8 - Gas VS Induction https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fe_711l42e4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fe_711l42e4 - Gas VS Induction Tl;dr over 50% of heat from a gas stove ends up in the environment. Nearly 100% of the energy from an induction cook top ends up in the pot.
- pandaman 5y agoThe trick in the videos is to use a narrow vessel. I suspect that if they used a bigger pot or, say, a kettle it would not be as impressive. In the second video it's a gas stove from Thermador (you can tell by the star-shaped burner) witch is usually 5K watt burners in the front. I don't know what induction stove they have but seeing that they have multiple "burners" that come together to 10-11K watt max, I'd say it's 3K watt tops. The gas stove is losing way more than 50% heat to be almost twice slower, which is not a surprise since the pot is smaller than the burner.
- HardwareLust 5y agoI'll take 53 days. The stress and frustration of having to use an electric or induction stove every day would take a far greater toll.
- sokoloff 5y agoI have (and like) gas. I’d happily switch to induction but would never voluntarily go back to resistance electric.
- colechristensen 5y agoIf you look carefully for the portable induction burners that are rated for ~1.3 kW, they are excellent. You can get them for about $100 and they would replace about half your cooktop usage. Much better for low temperature work and boiling type work.
- sokoloff 5y agoWe have one and it’s great for low-and-slow unattended cooking. We don’t use it for regular/daily cooking because we just don’t have the space to give it, but agreed that it would work technically for a lot of our cooking if it took up space where the cooktop is or if our kitchen was bigger/had more countertop space.
- abletonlive 5y agoDon't know what you're talking about. Induction is far superior.
- giantg2 5y agoI feel it's only a matter of time until we start to identify health threats from inductive fields.
- sokoloff 5y agoThe ones on a induction cooktop are pretty close-coupled and we’re surrounded by other EMF fields (natural and artificial); among the unknown unknown hazards in life, I suspect this one’s pretty low.
- JoeAltmaier 5y agoDoes that factor in the better food you get to eat for a lifetime? That has to have some effect, and likely far greater than 53 days. And curiously, simply using a venting hood is mocked by the OP with no actual evidence. Possibly, it mitigates the issue entirely.
- jnwatson 5y agoGas stoves leak even when not cooking. Unless you leave the vent on, it still contributes to indoor pollution.
- asdff 5y agoHow much methane is being leaked? I also leak methane. Scale is important in these discussions.
- michaelmior 5y ago> Does that factor in the better food you get to eat for a lifetime? How do gas stoves make better food than electric? Certainly there's a difference in the experience of cooking, but once you are accustomed to that, I think equally good food can be made in either. Even if food cooked on an electric cooktop was somewhat lower quality (however "better" is measured) I fail to see how that would have a significant impact on life expectancy.
- jimbob45 5y ago>My best guess is that if you use a gas stove for your entire life instead of an electric stove and change nothing else, that shortens your life expectancy by around 53 days on average How much is "use"? I "use" my stove maybe once a month now and never for more than 10 minutes (usually to boil pasta). Also, as a side note, I hate gas stoves and would love for them to be banned. The stress I feel when the gas doesn't immediately ignite is dumb.
- michaelmior 5y ago> I hate gas stoves and would love for them to be banned I'm curious. I understand you don't like cooking with gas stoves, but why do you think they should be banned? Many significantly prefer them and the impact that others using gas stoves has on your well-being is unclear.
- gjvc 5y ago> The stress I feel when the gas doesn't immediately ignite is dumb. This is not normal. Remove the burner caps and heads, clean all the way round them, and ensure they are reseated correctly. This video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vG6JcvW_cYg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vG6JcvW_cYg demonstrates how to do it.
- Mountain_Skies 5y agoWhy is your reaction to anything you don't like is to have it banned?
- jaywalk 5y agoYes, that stress you feel is dumb. So your dumb stress means gas stoves should be banned? How about you just use whatever type of stove you want and leave everyone else alone.
- asdff 5y agoClean the gunk out of your burners and it will light instantly if its seated correctly.
- Naga 5y agoI'm guessing from reading the article that it's not applicable, but does this affect gas barbecues as well? I'm guessing not since they are outdoors. Gas barbecues are pretty common in my neck of the woods, although gas stoves are not.
- giantg2 5y agoThey probably have a calculation for that somewhere, but not based on NOx. I think it's based on the potentially carcinogen charred meat.
- stinkytaco 5y agoI like my induction cooktop. Sometimes I'm annoyed that I can't use a wok, and the buzzing is annoying if it's a poorly made pan, but all and all, the peace of mind of my child not leaving it on by accident, the immediate response to temp change and the health benefits make it a good option for my house. One of my favorite cooking quotes is from Mario Batali: “Only bad cooks blame the equipment. I can make almost every dish in my restaurants on four crummy electric burners with a regular oven, as can just about anyone else who cares to.”
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- michaelmior 5y agoNever had an induction cooktop. Why can't you use a wok? I can see why it wouldn't be as nice as having a flame, but are induction woks really so bad as to be unusable?
- vosper 5y agoYou can use a wok, it just isn't quite as good as gas because woks tend to have a smallish flat bottom, and with induction only that bottom part is getting heated. With gas the bottom part gets heated but the flames also heat up the sides of the wok. You can get woks with wider bases for induction cooktops. I haven't tried one, but I think it could fix the issue. https://www.tefal.co.nz/c/Daily-Cook-Stainless-Steel-Non-stick-Induction-Wok-28cm-%2B-Lid/p/2100121266 https://www.tefal.co.nz/c/Daily-Cook-Stainless-Steel-Non-sti...
- michaelmior 5y agoThat's a fair point. I have a flat bottom wok that I use on my electric stovetop and it definitely has a hard time heating as much as I'd like.
- insaneirish 5y agoPurpose built induction wok hobs can be very, very good, but there are two potential problems with a regular induction range and a wok: 1. For a round wok, you'd need an 'adapter' to hold the wok. 2. for a flat bottom wok, you might not get enough surface area on the induction element.
- tomphoolery 5y agoYeah but how much does your life expectancy decrease by just living in New York City? I bet it's more. So yeah give me 53 days but take 5 years?
- alliao 5y agoI know that induction can be faster than gas on energy output alone, but it's just so hard to find how their coils are designed thus what the heating pattern look like when you put a pan on it...
- michaelmior 5y agoOne test I've heard for finding heating patterns is to sprinkle a small layer of flour on the bottom of a pan and then watch it carefully to see where it browns.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- asdff 5y agoIs this assuming you run it ventilated or ventilated? This makes a big difference. Most gas stove users probably don't bother turning on their vent hood, some vent hoods aren't even connected to the outside by contractors who install them.
- hammock 5y agoThis is a lot of commentary for something that probably has a simple solution. The author mentions it, but doesn't provide a satisfying answer: >Can a range hood fix this? Yes, if you have a colossal jet-powered A+ grade hood with a fan that vents outside. With an average range hood, maybe not Well, does a decent range hood (vented to the outside) fix it or not? Author provided a non-answer. Regular hoods are pretty good in my experience.
- dang 5y agoLots of previous threads but the big ones seem to be How bad is my gas stove? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29935939 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29935939 - Jan 2022 (520 comments) Cities try to phase out gas stoves but cooks are pushing back - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27874912 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27874912 - July 2021 (481 comments) Experts are sounding the alarm about the hidden dangers of gas stoves - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25332332 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25332332 - Dec 2020 (343 comments)
- PragmaticPulp 5y ago> Can a range hood fix this? > Yes, if you have a colossal jet-powered A+ grade hood with a fan that vents outside. Quite an exaggeration. Even cheap vent hoods (assuming vented to outside, of course) can move a lot of air. You don’t have to 100% mitigate the problem to make an impact. The author’s core analysis may be valid, but the rush to dismiss any mitigating factors feels like a significant bias showing through.
- com2kid 5y agoDepends. Newer houses are built almost air tight, you have to either open a window or have a makeup air system installed to pump air into the house while the vent fan is running. Unless you do that, the poor fan is working very hard trying to basically create a vacuum in your house.
- colechristensen 5y agoEveryone just needs HEPA filtration in their home. It shouldn’t be “do this because it’s good and not that because it’s bad” but knowing about, measuring, and mitigating fine particles in your life. Switching away from gas is one mitigation, but it doesn’t handle everything.
- Riseed 5y ago> Everyone just needs HEPA filtration in their home. HEPA filters don't filter NO2.
- lucisferre 5y agoThis is an extremely dubious "guess". Average life expectancy is just shy of 30,000 days, making this an effect of less than 0.2%. This would be impossible to even measure definitively. This article seems to be nothing more than logical conjecture and opinion. The related evidence also seems to be tangentially related at best.
- mmaunder 5y agoThe title is a bold statement considering how much ventilation varies. Yes, I'm aware he references this, but it's flip: "Yes, if you have a colossal jet-powered A+ grade hood with a fan that vents outside. With an average range hood, maybe not." or put differently - I don't know and don't have data either way. Climate change is real. We MUST eliminate the burning of fossil fuels. But once again, the more I dug into this article, the more it feels like the desire for outcomes guiding how the data is presented. And the problem with that is it provides fuel for climate deniers and anyone else opposed to the outcome the researcher is hoping for. They're discrediting themselves, their peers and furthering the harm they're trying to mitigate. A few additional thoughts: I recently and grudgingly switched to electric, and I actually like the cheap-ass electric stove I'm using. It boils water faster than gas, but it's not as precise, and I'll take the speed over precision. Also, range hoods vary wildly from non-existent, to the side or back hood which is useless to an overhead hood which is spectacular, as evidenced by zero smoke when searing foods.
- asdff 5y agoI never got why people care about boiling water so fast. It comes up too when people talk about induction stoves. I mean, you are cooking, not waiting and watching for the water to boil. You are probably working on sauce for your pasta while the water is waiting to boil anyhow, or could find a hundred other tasks just in the kitchen alone to occupy yourself while this entirely parallel process continues in the background. I don't care that water takes 4 minutes or 14 minutes to boil, I'm spending the same 30 seconds hands on time with the pot of water in either case.
- mmaunder 5y ago> I mean, you are cooking, not waiting and watching for the water to boil. Of course not. It'll never boil if you watch it. Boiling is a proxy for gets-hot-fast which is useful.
- asdff 5y agoBut like how useful is that even? That's what I take issue with. All this cost for a pan to heat up 2 mins faster. So many products in this world exist to simply to add a crumb of convenience and imo something like a pan heating up slightly faster is one of them. It's like, did we need to spend this engineering effort (which is a finite skilled resource) making something 5% more convenient? Did I really need to spend all that money on 5%? On something that I already don't think much of at all? That I didn't even consider a problem until a tech blog or whatever wrote an article about it? Capitalism is truly a bizarre system.
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago53 days over a lifetime and the only controlled for the basic demographic and location stuff (and I thank them for doing that, many people with an axe to grind don't even bother)? That sounds so small it could be confounded by just about any spurious correlation.
- nabla9 5y agoFor comparison, Covid-19 risk 2-18 months depending on the age. (2 months for people below 20, 18 months for 60). From Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication. https://medium.com/wintoncentre/how-much-normal-risk-does-covid-represent-4539118e1196 https://medium.com/wintoncentre/how-much-normal-risk-does-co...
- hkchad 5y agoYea but those 53 days I probably can't chew anything worth cooking on any stove anyway. You can pry my gas stove from my 53 day old cold dead hands.