Dear Ron,
If you wish to convert the topic to a discussion of WorldStove, please
change the Subject line.
Nat is a nice fellow with a great product, but his sharing needs to be
more than what I have seen, in my personal opinion. He has given
nothing about his emissions tests, and I know of no independent person
who has complete access to his technology for giving us more feedback.
Success by WorldStove is desirable, but so is success by First
Energy and Philips. May they all be successful. ALL of them have
honorable goals, including making a profit AND helping the poor who
could have access to those stoves. Good.
Once again, I have been blunt.
Now, can we please discuss what I wrote about?
Paul
Quoting [email protected]:
Paul and ccs (adding "Biochar-policy")
I like all parts of your message below with one exception - thank
you for being blunt. The exception is your statement that World
Stove (Nathaniel Mulcahy) is acting like the other four in your
five-corporation secrecy list. Today, Nat recommended a new video
that I found clever but in no way informative about the technical
side of his stove operations. But while looking at the new one, I
saw this other 1:37 minute video about the Lucia:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Zefrhc8kgM&NR=1&feature=fvwp
Because I have been to his Italian facility and played with several
Lucias with several fuels, I can assure everyone that a careful
(cursory won't do it) review of what is shown and stated there (and
you wouldn't need one in hand) would allow one to duplicate it and
understand its principles of operation completely. Nat's is truly a
remarkable invention - I know I could not have developed it myself.
This video is the complete opposite of secrecy.
With several presentations at stove, Biochar, and UN-sponsored
climate meetings, Nat has freely discussed how it works and has
passed it around for close examination. He is showing a totally free
(much simpler) design at his web site. But he did all this only
after getting his patents. I think it is indeed a unique product
that is worthy of patent protection in the best sense of that word.
I presume that others are free to try to improve upon it and get
there own patents - but my guess is that Nat's is pretty tight .
Everyone should go into intentional avoidance of patents with good
lawyers on your side first. What's more to get to the foundry
casting of the two key parts is not a low budget operation.
So, I think it is much too hard on Nat (who has used up a great deal
of his savings and quite a few years of his life) to say he is not
sharing information Companies like those you have listed all have to
make money or they go out of existence. A certain amount of secrecy
comes with the territory. My point is that Nat has been remarkably
open - I think because he has a new idea that is patent protected.
Without that protection, we would not have this stove development. I
can't see how any of the other four can make any claim on novelty or
patents - which they probably all have. His product/patent is
scalable to much larger sizes than simple stoves - where patent
protection is obviously very critical. He seems to be open to joint
ventures. Note he has been careful in training programs with only
in-country assembly and a great emphasis on using the produced char
for ag and sequestration purposes. So I feel that the implication
that he is in this only for money is unfair
He still has to compete on price and performance with TLUDs (and
hopefully some other future designs). There is no monopoly situation
here
I have no financial interest in World Stoves or any other similar
stove or pyrolysis operation.
Ron
----- Original Message -----
From: [email protected]
To: "Discussion of biomass cooking stoves"
<[email protected]>, "Otto Formo" <[email protected]>,
[email protected]
Cc: [email protected], "Discussion of biomass cooking
stoves" <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, December 5, 2010 12:09:35 PM
Subject: Disapprovals about being too closed. Re: [Stoves] Air
supply in TLUDs
Dear Otto, Dean, and all Stovers,
I take issue with one statement by Otto, who wrote about Aprovecho's efforts:
Good advice:
Leave it to others to test and tune the TLUD ND Gasifier Units,
please....................
I disagree. We (the Stover community) need everyone working on these
issues. And Dean at Aprovecho has great facilities for doing testing
of emissions. Dean, keep up the good work!!
Having said that, I now take issue with Dean and the apparent
Aprovecho approach which is:
1. Not providing all of the information that the others want to have
about what testing is going on with the TLUD stoves.
2. At Aprovecho, not involving to any noticable extent any of the
pioneers or other experienced advocates of the TLUD stoves.
3. Having made a major shift of direction from many years of "polite
tolerance of TLUD gasifiers" to very recent "strong advocacy of TLUD
gasifiers with bias toward Aprovecho recent initiatives." EVERYONE is
most welcome to get onto the TLUD bandwagon, but let's not get into
"private" separate bandwagons.
Comments:
Sure, everyone is chasing the money. The money for stoves has been so
sparse in the past, and it now looks to be like major piles of funds
could come to some participants, especially those with a tradition of
being the advisors of the funding sources or recipients of grants in
the past.
I commend Aprovecho for its leadership and contacts in the past. But
not if it takes a self-serving approach at the expense of those who
have cumulative decades of experience. Is Aprovecho trying to enter
the big-time with corporate approaches to the stoves problems?
And while I am at it, why not "prickle" the entire "corporate world
approach." The major work by First Energy India (former BP project)
and the Philips efforts got mentioned in the recent article by Kirk
Smith as if they were the only serious accomplishments with the most
modern stoves. Those cooporations have thrown major money (millions
of dollars) to have products that now can attract Dr. Smith's attention.
But those corporate efforts have SHARED NOTHING with the rest of us.
No info about emissions levels, no cross-fertilization with others.
"Do it alone or do not do it at all" seems to be too closed, in my
opinion.
And does that apply to others such as Stove Tech, Enviro-fit, World
Stove, and any others? They all seem to be determined to do it all in
isolation, keeping everything to themselves. (Some exceptions like
giving away tid-bits of designs or info does not equate to openness,
but is good salemanship.)
Is that the way to do business to benefit the poorest of the poor and
even the moderately poor? Perhaps it is, or so it seems to be in the
capitalist model of stove work that is getting the attention.
However, the world arrived at its 2009 state of TLUD knowledge almost
entirely by the efforts of dedicated individuals primarily on
personally donated time and materials or as side-efforts to their main
employment. Not one of those person is yet deceased, and all are
still willing -- and highly capable -- to donate and contribute to
accomplish their dreams. But there are limits, especially when
exclusion is stronger than inclusion.
Sincerely,
Paul
"Dr. TLUD"
Quoting Otto Formo <[email protected]>:
Dear all,
I just happend to see this statements about the TLUD ND PekoPe and
are a bit surprized that Dean, claims "his" TLUD only can use
pellets and for how long the pellets lasts in the combustion chamber
as a flame and charcoal.
To my knowledge, the real "PekoPe" burns with an open flame for
about two hours and glow for another 4-5 houers by using 2,5 kg of
pellets made out of wood (pine)..!?
The other thing I noted was that "his" TLUD gives a number of 400 mg
PM, while Paal`s prototype done at the Aprovech Research Center,
only gave 223 mg PM in 2009!?
A lot of water has passed in the river Nile since then, even in
Zambezi...........:)
Good advice:
Leave it to others to test and tune the TLUD ND Gasifier Units,
please....................
Otto
Forester and still a TLUD ND "PekoPe" fan............without a fan........
From: [email protected]
Sent: 2010-12-05 07:54:22 MET
To: Discussion of biomass cooking stoves [[email protected]]
Subject: [Stoves] Air supply in TLUDs
Dean
I think you are describing below only a TLUD that has no control
over the primary air supply. Or one that has a turn down ratio of
unity. We should be able to do much better.
I urge having a means of controlling the primary air supply. If one
is intending to consume the produced char, there will be a mighty
small flame at the end or a huge flame at the beginning.
There are many ways to control the primary air - at low cost.
Ron
----- Original Message -----
From: "Dean Still" <[email protected]>
To: "Discussion of biomass cooking stoves"
<[email protected]>
Sent: Thursday, December 2, 2010 10:30:33 PM
Subject: Re: [Stoves] K Smith Article in Energy for Sustainable Development
Hi All,
Adding more air holes in the bottom of the fuel chamber in a TLUD
allows pellets to burn up completely. If users want bio-char they
just have to have fewer holes. Then the char is made since there is
not enough air to support burning it.
If it is tuned (!), the TLUD is very low in PM when it does not
make smoke when starting and finishing the burn. CO is also
generally low. In the well tuned TLUD we generally see around 7g of
CO and 400mg of PM during the WBT compared to a carefully operated
open fire at 55g CO and 2300mg PM. Generally the TLUD makes less
smoke at the finish with more air holes because all the wood burns
up without making smoke.
Isn't it great that a TLUD can be operated in both char making and
no char making modes?
The user can choose whether they want greater fuel efficiency or to
make an agricultural additive.
Best,
Dean
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