title: Real-time assessment of black carbon pollution in Indian households due to traditional and improved biomass cookstoves.
abstract: Use of improved (biomass) cookstoves (ICs) has been widely proposed as a Black Carbon (BC) mitigation measure with significant climate and health benefits. ICs encompass a range of technologies, including natural draft (ND) stoves, which feature structural modifications to enhance air flow, and forced draft (FD) stoves, which additionally employ an external fan to force air into the combustion chamber. We present here, under Project Surya, the first real-time in situ Black Carbon (BC) concentration measurements from five commercial ICs and a traditional (mud) cookstove for comparison. These experiments reveal four significant findings about the tested stoves. First, FD stoves emerge as the superior IC technology, reducing plume zone BC concentration by a factor of 4 (compared to 1.5 for ND). Indoor cooking-time BC concentrations, which varied from 50 to 1000 μg m(-3) for the traditional mud cookstove, were reduced to 5-100 μg m(-3) by the top-performing FD stove. Second, BC reductions from IC models in the same technology category vary significantly: for example, some ND models occasionally emit more BC than a traditional cookstove. Within the ND class, only microgasification stoves were effective in reducing BC. Third, BC concentration varies significantly for repeated cooking cycles with same stove (standard deviation up to 50% of mean concentration) even in a standardized setup, highlighting inherent uncertainties in cookstove performance. Fourth, use of mixed fuel (reflective of local practices) increases plume zone BC concentration (compared to hardwood) by a factor of 2 to 3 across ICs.
authors.affiliation: The Energy and Resources Institute, New Delhi, India.
authors.forename: Abhishek
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kar
authors.forename: Ibrahim H
authors.initials: IH
authors.lastname: Rehman
authors.forename: Jennifer
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Burney
authors.forename: S Praveen
authors.initials: SP
authors.lastname: Puppala
authors.forename: Ramasubramanyaiyer
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Suresh
authors.forename: Lokendra
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Singh
authors.forename: Vivek K
authors.initials: VK
authors.lastname: Singh
authors.forename: Tanveer
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Ahmed
authors.forename: Nithya
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Ramanathan
authors.forename: Veerabhadran
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Ramanathan
mesh_terms: D000393:Air Pollutants / Q000032:analysis*; D016902:Air Pollution, Indoor / Q000032:analysis*; D018533:Biomass; D003296:Cooking; D005191:Family Characteristics; D006794:Household Articles; D007194:India; D053260:Soot / Q000032:analysis*; D013997:Time Factors; D014934:Wood
chemical_list: D000393:Air Pollutants; D053260:Soot