Research meta-analysis says gas stoves give off unsafe N02 levels and increase risk of childhood asthma by 34% and are responsible for 12.7% of childhood asthma. None of this is new. The way safety panic works is that you focus on a particular risk this week and an attempt is made to make everyone’s life worse in its name.
This is not criticism of you or Oster, as you both are obviously already on the "let's look into whether claims about risk/safety are overblown" beat, and do a great job at it, but for everyone else:
Every time something like this comes up, I wonder what [actually serious thing] is going on that everyone would like to ignore and instead hype talk about [gas stoves], which has no relevant reason to be Main Topic this week. Honestly, I hate to give praise to a senator, but Manchin is exactly right: the response to this shouldn't be "yay ban gas!" or "no don't ban gas" it should be: "What vastly more important (or more harmful, or less infringing on freedom) thing are we (or the CPSC) ignoring?" Like when the CDC had vaping and mushrooms as 2 of the 3 topic "epidemics" to fight. If we argue about whether or vaping is actually bad or good, that misses the point, which is: wtf is wrong with this agency's priorities?
Isn't Europe using coal for electricity generation because there's a shortage of natural gas? So if gas usage in cooking declined, there would be more available for electricity generation
I just want to mention that induction stoves are pretty nice and IMHO roughly comparable to gas in cooking convenience (well, except for roasting things on an open flame obviously). They are also really nice to clean (since have a flat ceramic surface).
In German-speaking Europe (where I spent most of my life), gas stoves are quite unusual and thus I I never used one extensively, so maybe I am missing some super-convenient aspect of them. But between similar effective energy output (and latency) and the ease of cleaning, I would chose induction over gas if I had a choice.
In reality I live in a rented house with a terrible electric stove that I loathe (not induction but classic resistive heating).
The real benefits, climate and otherwise, to eliminating gas come from heating, not cooking, which used an order of magnitude more gas per household. If gas heating becomes uneconomical you won’t have to ban gas stoves in new construction because nobody’s spending money on gas piping just for stoves.
Also? I had to use an induction cooktop for a month while waiting for National Grid to turn on my gas and it was pretty great tbh.
> When choosing where to rent, one absolutely has a choice. We made it a point to ensure our apartment had a gas stove, both when renting and when buying.
I will say this hasn't been my experience - last time I was looking for an apartment in New York I had a preference for an apartment with an electric stove but couldn't find one that otherwise satisfied my preferences (I don't think any of the apartments I visited at all had electric stoves).
I don't in general support banning things but do wish nice modern electric stoves were easier to find in new rental apartments in New York. I suspect this kind of push will help them be seen as high-status in some liberal circles which could help with that (although if it gets to the point of an outright ban that would overdo it and be bad again).
When I bought my house, my wife and I made certain it had a gas range. Especially as we stir fry in a wok often, we've had terrible experiences with electric ranges. Gas is superior to electric when cooking. It's not even a contest.
I haven't used induction and I'm sure it's superior to the electric coil technology, but I'm not sure how well it would do with a wok. I'm skeptical.
Anyway, this talk of banning gas ranges is stupid. I agree with Manchin: is this really the most important thing to be working on right now?
TBF it makes no sense whatsoever to lump resistive and inductive stoves together as "electric" in terms of how good it is to cook with them --- IME induction ≳ gas ⋙ resistive electric
Here's my problem with your point 1: at some point, indoor air quality does matter. Instead of looking at the studies around stoves, we should analyze the claim itself. How does the amount of no2 compare to other activities and items (standing nearby a car that's running). How much no2 is actually unhealthy?
It could be that this is a good move with bad studies. I'm sure there's good data about relative no2 put off by various things, and I'm sure there's good data about indoor air quality in general. I don't see the dismissal of these specific studies disproving the overall theory.
And... There's lots of things that were superior or cost effective that we no longer use for health reasons. Trans fats is the one to happen in my lifetime.
I am anti-banning-gas-stoves, but note that I don't see the fight in new construction being the meaningful driver here. After all, America is wildly anti-home-building generally, and the parts where you can still build easily apparently are low-gas-stove-usage communities. The real question is whether people start tearing out their existing gas stoves in their existing homes for some whizbang electric superfast induction stove thingamajig.
After all, we live in a world where we have massive investment in electric and battery tech, and there seem to be some cool prototypes out there. I could definitely see a world where gas gets outflanked by innovation and choice here, over time.
I have an induction hob and it is as good as gas. It's quicker at heating than gas and the control is as good. There's not quite as much freedom for wok cooking but I believe there are options. Eventually gas stoves will be phased out as we abandon fossil fuels. But electric stoves can be extremely good now. Not worth banning gas stoves now but the move away is inevitable.
So while I am still firmly in camp "gas stoves are the best" (while stuck with a very old, very crappy electric stove), I have been convinced recently that new induction cook tops go a very long way in closing the gap and, in a few particular ways, are actually better. As far as I can tell, the single way that the lag the furthest behind (and in which I see no way they could ever catch up) is the ability to lift or tilt the pan off the cooking surface and maintain heating, which you might want to do if you are searing a steak and want to baste in butter, or something similar (this may be something you don't care about, which is great for you, it's something that I frequently lament on my current electric coil stove).
But in max temp output, they are apparently basically the same to household gas stoves (although they can't get as hot as very high output commercial/restaurant gas stoves), they are/can be faster for things like boiling water, they are safer, and more efficient, and can also be easier to clean.
However, to reach that performance parity, you have to pay _way_ more. Gas stoves reach their performance peak basically at the ground floor of quality. An entry level gas stove probably has 90+% of the performance of a top end model. When you buy high end gas ranges you are paying for looks more than anything else. In my research, there basically is no such thing as "low end induction ranges" yet, so to get mostly similar performance (with that one glaring weakness in mind), you may have to pay triple or more for an induction stove. Not to mention the fact that most of the current induction models have the absolutely _abhorrent_ inclusion of "smart" features that I would literally pay extra money to remove if that was an option.
-edit- as mentioned in a comment I made elsewhere...my brain keeps inserting "stove" when I mean "range", so if you see stove, replace with range.
I've been reading a lot of very pro-induction takes over the past few days, as indeed I did the last time we had this debate a year or more ago. I know Zvi does, but it seems almost no one remembers that this exact issue (a potential "ban" on gas stoves) has been fought over before. Even people I respect mightily, like Charles C.W. Cooke, appear to have forgotten.
Regardless, many of these pro-induction takes are premised on the idea that induction is superior to gas in every way, even including evenness of heat. I beg to fucking differ.
I started cooking about two years ago shortly after I moved into my first home. I was watching bro chefs on Youtube who frequently recommended induction. I (a right-wing nutjob, to be clear) picked up the exact one used by Josh Weissman, a countertop Duxtop. Excellent reviews, all the good stuff. I used it for about a year. It was and is really good at boiling water and deep frying.
It's garbage at almost anything else. I had deeply bought into the idea that induction provided even heat better than gas. I repeated this claim unprompted several times when discussing it with my brother. This is complete bullshit (or so it seems to me), and finding that out entirely destroyed my confidence in the technology. The tipping point came when I tried to simmer a big dutch oven full of Bolognese on it. The recipe called for 1 hour of simmering to reduce by 20-25% or something. I let it simmer for FOUR HOURS and it reduced not at all. It was also very inconsistent in making things like smash burgers. Also, the countertop burner made a horrible sound when used, which I could actually feel in my teeth, and the fan was incredibly loud as well.
I posted on reddit about the simmering issue, and got a ton of useful comments telling me that induction only heats a small portion of the pan. I thought back, and remembered that, when the sauce was simmering, there were bubbles coming from only two very small points at the center of the dutch oven, and those bubbles were like a rolling boil, so I had to stir constantly to avoid burning in the tiny spot that was being heated.
This pissed me off to no end. I had worked all day on that sauce, and while I did manage to partially salvage it by putting it in the oven, afterward I put the induction cooktop in the pantry and have had zero desire to get it out again (I also repaired the central power burner on my gas stove, which helped).
Still, the quantity of pro-induction takes, many of them containing particularly this claim about evenness of heat stated very stridently, and going unchallenged, plus the lack of reviews or questions on Amazon about my issue, makes me think that perhaps mine was defective. But I really have zero confidence in it as a technology anymore, so I am not at all inclined to try picking up another one or getting the one I have warrantied.
Anyone else have similar experiences? Dissimilar?
Also, all of this is a distraction. The true king of even heat is the oven. It is the tool you need for almost every job that isn't boiling water or frying. I learned this from Kenji Lopez-Alt, and now I put everything I possibly can, particularly slow-cooked tomato-based sauces, in the oven. Bubbles all the way to the edge, better even than gas.
This is not criticism of you or Oster, as you both are obviously already on the "let's look into whether claims about risk/safety are overblown" beat, and do a great job at it, but for everyone else:
Every time something like this comes up, I wonder what [actually serious thing] is going on that everyone would like to ignore and instead hype talk about [gas stoves], which has no relevant reason to be Main Topic this week. Honestly, I hate to give praise to a senator, but Manchin is exactly right: the response to this shouldn't be "yay ban gas!" or "no don't ban gas" it should be: "What vastly more important (or more harmful, or less infringing on freedom) thing are we (or the CPSC) ignoring?" Like when the CDC had vaping and mushrooms as 2 of the 3 topic "epidemics" to fight. If we argue about whether or vaping is actually bad or good, that misses the point, which is: wtf is wrong with this agency's priorities?
Isn't Europe using coal for electricity generation because there's a shortage of natural gas? So if gas usage in cooking declined, there would be more available for electricity generation
I just want to mention that induction stoves are pretty nice and IMHO roughly comparable to gas in cooking convenience (well, except for roasting things on an open flame obviously). They are also really nice to clean (since have a flat ceramic surface).
In German-speaking Europe (where I spent most of my life), gas stoves are quite unusual and thus I I never used one extensively, so maybe I am missing some super-convenient aspect of them. But between similar effective energy output (and latency) and the ease of cleaning, I would chose induction over gas if I had a choice.
In reality I live in a rented house with a terrible electric stove that I loathe (not induction but classic resistive heating).
The real benefits, climate and otherwise, to eliminating gas come from heating, not cooking, which used an order of magnitude more gas per household. If gas heating becomes uneconomical you won’t have to ban gas stoves in new construction because nobody’s spending money on gas piping just for stoves.
Also? I had to use an induction cooktop for a month while waiting for National Grid to turn on my gas and it was pretty great tbh.
> When choosing where to rent, one absolutely has a choice. We made it a point to ensure our apartment had a gas stove, both when renting and when buying.
I will say this hasn't been my experience - last time I was looking for an apartment in New York I had a preference for an apartment with an electric stove but couldn't find one that otherwise satisfied my preferences (I don't think any of the apartments I visited at all had electric stoves).
I don't in general support banning things but do wish nice modern electric stoves were easier to find in new rental apartments in New York. I suspect this kind of push will help them be seen as high-status in some liberal circles which could help with that (although if it gets to the point of an outright ban that would overdo it and be bad again).
Ctrl+F: "induction" - zero matches.
When I bought my house, my wife and I made certain it had a gas range. Especially as we stir fry in a wok often, we've had terrible experiences with electric ranges. Gas is superior to electric when cooking. It's not even a contest.
I haven't used induction and I'm sure it's superior to the electric coil technology, but I'm not sure how well it would do with a wok. I'm skeptical.
Anyway, this talk of banning gas ranges is stupid. I agree with Manchin: is this really the most important thing to be working on right now?
TBF it makes no sense whatsoever to lump resistive and inductive stoves together as "electric" in terms of how good it is to cook with them --- IME induction ≳ gas ⋙ resistive electric
Here's my problem with your point 1: at some point, indoor air quality does matter. Instead of looking at the studies around stoves, we should analyze the claim itself. How does the amount of no2 compare to other activities and items (standing nearby a car that's running). How much no2 is actually unhealthy?
It could be that this is a good move with bad studies. I'm sure there's good data about relative no2 put off by various things, and I'm sure there's good data about indoor air quality in general. I don't see the dismissal of these specific studies disproving the overall theory.
And... There's lots of things that were superior or cost effective that we no longer use for health reasons. Trans fats is the one to happen in my lifetime.
I am anti-banning-gas-stoves, but note that I don't see the fight in new construction being the meaningful driver here. After all, America is wildly anti-home-building generally, and the parts where you can still build easily apparently are low-gas-stove-usage communities. The real question is whether people start tearing out their existing gas stoves in their existing homes for some whizbang electric superfast induction stove thingamajig.
After all, we live in a world where we have massive investment in electric and battery tech, and there seem to be some cool prototypes out there. I could definitely see a world where gas gets outflanked by innovation and choice here, over time.
What should we make of the claim that electric stoves/ranges have higher risks w.r.t. fires and associated injuries? (e.g. https://twitter.com/charlescwcooke/status/1613167585863802880)
I have an induction hob and it is as good as gas. It's quicker at heating than gas and the control is as good. There's not quite as much freedom for wok cooking but I believe there are options. Eventually gas stoves will be phased out as we abandon fossil fuels. But electric stoves can be extremely good now. Not worth banning gas stoves now but the move away is inevitable.
So while I am still firmly in camp "gas stoves are the best" (while stuck with a very old, very crappy electric stove), I have been convinced recently that new induction cook tops go a very long way in closing the gap and, in a few particular ways, are actually better. As far as I can tell, the single way that the lag the furthest behind (and in which I see no way they could ever catch up) is the ability to lift or tilt the pan off the cooking surface and maintain heating, which you might want to do if you are searing a steak and want to baste in butter, or something similar (this may be something you don't care about, which is great for you, it's something that I frequently lament on my current electric coil stove).
But in max temp output, they are apparently basically the same to household gas stoves (although they can't get as hot as very high output commercial/restaurant gas stoves), they are/can be faster for things like boiling water, they are safer, and more efficient, and can also be easier to clean.
However, to reach that performance parity, you have to pay _way_ more. Gas stoves reach their performance peak basically at the ground floor of quality. An entry level gas stove probably has 90+% of the performance of a top end model. When you buy high end gas ranges you are paying for looks more than anything else. In my research, there basically is no such thing as "low end induction ranges" yet, so to get mostly similar performance (with that one glaring weakness in mind), you may have to pay triple or more for an induction stove. Not to mention the fact that most of the current induction models have the absolutely _abhorrent_ inclusion of "smart" features that I would literally pay extra money to remove if that was an option.
-edit- as mentioned in a comment I made elsewhere...my brain keeps inserting "stove" when I mean "range", so if you see stove, replace with range.
I've been reading a lot of very pro-induction takes over the past few days, as indeed I did the last time we had this debate a year or more ago. I know Zvi does, but it seems almost no one remembers that this exact issue (a potential "ban" on gas stoves) has been fought over before. Even people I respect mightily, like Charles C.W. Cooke, appear to have forgotten.
Regardless, many of these pro-induction takes are premised on the idea that induction is superior to gas in every way, even including evenness of heat. I beg to fucking differ.
I started cooking about two years ago shortly after I moved into my first home. I was watching bro chefs on Youtube who frequently recommended induction. I (a right-wing nutjob, to be clear) picked up the exact one used by Josh Weissman, a countertop Duxtop. Excellent reviews, all the good stuff. I used it for about a year. It was and is really good at boiling water and deep frying.
It's garbage at almost anything else. I had deeply bought into the idea that induction provided even heat better than gas. I repeated this claim unprompted several times when discussing it with my brother. This is complete bullshit (or so it seems to me), and finding that out entirely destroyed my confidence in the technology. The tipping point came when I tried to simmer a big dutch oven full of Bolognese on it. The recipe called for 1 hour of simmering to reduce by 20-25% or something. I let it simmer for FOUR HOURS and it reduced not at all. It was also very inconsistent in making things like smash burgers. Also, the countertop burner made a horrible sound when used, which I could actually feel in my teeth, and the fan was incredibly loud as well.
I posted on reddit about the simmering issue, and got a ton of useful comments telling me that induction only heats a small portion of the pan. I thought back, and remembered that, when the sauce was simmering, there were bubbles coming from only two very small points at the center of the dutch oven, and those bubbles were like a rolling boil, so I had to stir constantly to avoid burning in the tiny spot that was being heated.
This pissed me off to no end. I had worked all day on that sauce, and while I did manage to partially salvage it by putting it in the oven, afterward I put the induction cooktop in the pantry and have had zero desire to get it out again (I also repaired the central power burner on my gas stove, which helped).
Still, the quantity of pro-induction takes, many of them containing particularly this claim about evenness of heat stated very stridently, and going unchallenged, plus the lack of reviews or questions on Amazon about my issue, makes me think that perhaps mine was defective. But I really have zero confidence in it as a technology anymore, so I am not at all inclined to try picking up another one or getting the one I have warrantied.
Anyone else have similar experiences? Dissimilar?
Also, all of this is a distraction. The true king of even heat is the oven. It is the tool you need for almost every job that isn't boiling water or frying. I learned this from Kenji Lopez-Alt, and now I put everything I possibly can, particularly slow-cooked tomato-based sauces, in the oven. Bubbles all the way to the edge, better even than gas.
The real rosebud in this is the child welfare aspect. It's always always to protect the children.