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mahatmakanejeeves

(57,405 posts)
Sat Feb 19, 2022, 08:09 AM Feb 2022

How electric stoves are poised to dethrone the mighty gas range

How electric stoves are poised to dethrone the mighty gas range



How electric stoves are poised to dethrone the mighty gas range
Professional and home cooks are embracing induction cooktops as a more sustainable and healthy alternative to gas.

Home & Garden

How electric stoves are poised to dethrone the mighty gas range

By Meg St-Esprit McKivigan
February 17, 2022 at 7:00 a.m. EST

Tanuj Deora works in the energy industry — specifically to decarbonize energy systems. That’s the technical term for efforts to reduce the reliance on fossil fuels. It’s a vast and complex problem, but Deora and his family try to do their part. At their home in Northwest Washington, they have solar panels, LED lightbulbs and a hybrid minivan. In the kitchen, though, the issue of fossil fuel usage was more personal. Their natural gas cooktop was making Deora sick. ... “I would get a headache whenever the gas was running,” he says, so he started looking into replacing their gas stove.

But first, he had to sell his wife, Amy, on the idea. The two of them love to cook and make meals from scratch most nights. Amy believed that gas cooking was superior in performance. When they remodeled their kitchen in 2021, though, she agreed to try an induction stove. Five months later, they have no regrets. “This cooktop isn’t just adequate for cooking — it’s better than the gas stove was,” Deora says.

Gas cooktops do have some advantages. With gas, you can control the flame, and it’s easy to get the temperature you need, which has made it a preferred choice for those who consider themselves to be serious cooks. An estimated 90 percent of professional chefs still use gas.

Is it really that much better, though? The fossil fuel industry wants you to think so. Since the 1930s, it has targeted consumers with well-placed ads. It embraced the term “natural gas” to increase consumer confidence in indoor combustion. It even created a catchy rap in the 1980s, all in an effort to increase gas usage. The industry also flooded the market with images of massive gas ranges as the keystone of aspirational kitchens. But as new data emerges about health concerns, and as more Americans rethink their use of fossil fuels, the mighty gas stove might be facing dethronement.



[Gas stoves in kitchens pose a risk to public health and the planet, research finds]

{snip}

Meg St-Esprit McKivigan is a freelance writer in Pittsburgh.
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How electric stoves are poised to dethrone the mighty gas range (Original Post) mahatmakanejeeves Feb 2022 OP
That's interesting since electricity is a thermodynamically degraded form of energy increasingly... NNadir Feb 2022 #1
Hey, don't blame me. I get my electrons from Dominion Energy's Lake Anna nuclear plant. mahatmakanejeeves Feb 2022 #2
I'm not blaming you; I'm commenting on the rhetoric the article endorses. NNadir Feb 2022 #3
Oh, I knew that. I was just having fun. mahatmakanejeeves Feb 2022 #4
Every human is a hypocrite. ret5hd Feb 2022 #5
And what if the home owner not only Finishline42 Feb 2022 #6
I'm going to guess "none." mahatmakanejeeves Feb 2022 #7
Utilities are a cost plus regulated monopolies in most states Finishline42 Feb 2022 #8
Love my induction cooktop haricotblue Feb 2022 #9

NNadir

(33,512 posts)
1. That's interesting since electricity is a thermodynamically degraded form of energy increasingly...
Sat Feb 19, 2022, 09:48 AM
Feb 2022

...increasingly generated by the combustion of dangerous natural gas.

Of course, it's increasingly popular for people to lie to themselves and declare electricity "green."

mahatmakanejeeves

(57,405 posts)
2. Hey, don't blame me. I get my electrons from Dominion Energy's Lake Anna nuclear plant.
Sat Feb 19, 2022, 09:51 AM
Feb 2022

Northern Virginia has been getting its electricity from that facility for about fifty years now. I can look that up.

And good morning. The coffee's in the kitchen.

NNadir

(33,512 posts)
3. I'm not blaming you; I'm commenting on the rhetoric the article endorses.
Sat Feb 19, 2022, 10:05 AM
Feb 2022

For the record, I'm a hypocrite inasmuch as my home is heated with dangerous natural gas although I have had an electric stove for more than 25 years. For many years, half of my electricity generated in state was generated from nuclear energy, and I was happy to use electric space heaters to reduce, marginally, my climate impact.

Regrettably the Oyster Creek Nuclear Plant closed, and now there is a policy in place to fuck up our marine benthic environment by dumping concrete on it to support wind turbines that will be trash 25 years from now after shedding microplastics directly into the ocean. For clean, reliable and safe energy we have only Salem and Hope Creek nuclear plants left. That's not enough. I consider an electric space heater thermodynamically wasteful now.

Electricity here in New Jersey is less "green" than ever, and will be worse in the near future; less clean, less reliable and more expensive. I do hope that future generations will put the used nuclear fuel at Oyster Creek to good use and do something to save what's left and perhaps even restore some of what we are in the process of destroying.

mahatmakanejeeves

(57,405 posts)
4. Oh, I knew that. I was just having fun.
Sat Feb 19, 2022, 10:07 AM
Feb 2022

I've already had an incendiary post over in GD about DUers' far too common contempt for the First Amendment. I'm waiting for the reaction. I expect people will go nuclear.

Finishline42

(1,091 posts)
6. And what if the home owner not only
Sat Feb 19, 2022, 01:59 PM
Feb 2022

converts to an electric stove but also trades their ICE vehicle for an EV and has solar panels with battery storage?

Maybe ditching the gas stove is just the first step...

I wonder how many utility exec's dreams of new power plants were undercut by the switch to LED lights?

Finishline42

(1,091 posts)
8. Utilities are a cost plus regulated monopolies in most states
Sun Feb 20, 2022, 08:35 AM
Feb 2022

Any cost they can justify to the local PSC gets them a rate increase.

Energy Star is an EPA program so I would think that that rebate you would receive is a requirement by the Feds and/or paid by them.

The part about electricity demand not growing was in reference to the abandonment of the 2 reactors in mid-construction in SC.

The utilities also struggled with an energy landscape that had changed dramatically since the large reactors were proposed in 2007. Demand for electricity has plateaued nationwide as a result of major improvements in energy efficiency, weakening the case for massive new power plants. And a glut of cheap natural gas from the hydraulic fracturing boom has given states a low-cost energy alternative.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/31/climate/nuclear-power-project-canceled-in-south-carolina.html

haricotblue

(20 posts)
9. Love my induction cooktop
Wed Feb 23, 2022, 05:43 PM
Feb 2022

Switching to electric doesn't have to be another case of sacrificing performance for efficiency. I've cooked on gas all my life, and there is literally nothing that my induction cooktop -- an ordinary middle-of-the-road unit -- does not do as well or better than gas other than blackening peppers directly over the flame. It boils water faster, melts chocolate more gently, generates no waste heat (so you don't need as powerful a range hood fan), cleans with a wipe, is easy to adjust, etc. etc. It's just fantastic.

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