Highlights: A study this summer found that using a single gas stove burner on high can raise levels of cancer-causing benzene above what’s been observed from secondhand smoke.
A new investigation by NPR and the Climate Investigations Center found that the gas industry tried to downplay the health risks of gas stoves for decades, turning to many of the same public-relations tactics the tobacco industry used to cover up the risks of smoking. Gas utilities even hired some of the same PR firms and scientists that Big Tobacco did.
Earlier this year, an investigation from DeSmog showed that the industry understood the hazards of gas appliances as far back as the 1970s and concealed what they knew from the public.
It’s a strategy that goes back as far back as 1972, according to the most recent investigation. That year, the gas industry got advice from Richard Darrow, who helped manufacture controversy around the health effects of smoking as the lead for tobacco accounts at the public relations firm Hill + Knowlton. At an American Gas Association conference, Darrow told utilities they needed to respond to claims that gas appliances were polluting homes and shape the narrative around the issue before critics got the chance. Scientists were starting to discover that exposure to nitrogen dioxide—a pollutant emitted by gas stoves—was linked to respiratory illnesses. So Darrow advised utilities to “mount the massive, consistent, long-range public relations programs necessary to cope with the problems.”
These studies didn’t just confuse the public, but also the federal government. When the Environmental Protection Agency assessed the health effects of nitrogen dioxide pollution in 1982, its review included five studies finding no evidence of problems—four of which were funded by the gas industry, the Climate Investigations Center recently uncovered.
Karen Harbert, the American Gas Association’s CEO, acknowledged that the gas industry has “collaborated” with researchers to “inform and educate regulators about the safety of gas cooking appliances.” Harbert claimed that the available science “does not provide sufficient or consistent evidence demonstrating chronic health hazards from natural gas ranges”—a line that should sound familiar by now.
Technology connections informed me of this long ago! And it makes perfect sense. But almost every house I go in has a gas stove because apparently people think it’s better or nicer or “more professional” or whatever.
I find this crazy. I live in SE USA and I’ve never even seen a gas stove outside of camping. When everyone was “freaking out” online about the gas stove ban, I was just confused.
Haha! I go in about three houses per day for work and the majority will have gas. Also SE US. Although I’ve never had one in the places I’ve lived so if not for work I’d never have seen them either.
There’s a certain wealth line where they all have gas stoves. Look up the Wolf 6-burner gas range. Not something you find in a 3-2 home.
See those and thermador all the time haha such a waste
I grew up in a rural area, hence the no gas. I now live in a metro area and maybe it’s just my friends, but I’ve really never seen one. They always sounded dangerous to me.
Outside of this (and the utility fucking up, sending too much pressure, and blowing up a bunch of houses) they’re perfectly safe. Millions of homes around the world have gas service and incidents are very rare.
But given the health implications of just normal operation, I’m still not going to get a gas stove in the future.
I’m just here to let you know that in some rural areas, bottled gas is/was the viable solution.
Are there any restaurants that use electric stoves?
I think this is mostly because it is what cooks are used to. The ones who go to culinary school learned on gas stoves, and the ones who learned on the job also mostly learned on gas stoves.
Gas stoves aren’t the best option anymore. Induction stoves heat up much quicker and offer much finer heat control, but they are a bit more expensive, and many of the cooks would have to relearn how to make some of the stuff they are used to cooking.
So not only is it what cooks are used to, but it would require an investment from the restaurant that most aren’t willing to look into. Gas stoves last for many many years, so it’s not like they break down and need replacing regularly, either.
I’ve never been in a restaurant kitchen. Can’t tell you.
Acklutally, up until recently gas has been far cheaper than induction. It was leagues better than electric. Even today unless you are spending a lot more on a new stove and probably upping running costs; it’s expensive to move to conduction when gas stoves last for basically forever. It’s also quite regional to natural gas areas where it’s been cheaper than electricity.
If you want to sear meat at high temps, a powerful gas stove is still today going to outperform a induction.
I’ll gladly spend a little more time in front of a stove that isn’t actively killing me.
And that’s your choice. Just don’t pretend like there isn’t a valid reason so you can make fun of hillbillies.
What are you going on about? Who am I making fun of? There’s sound evidence that gas stoves emit harmful pollutants.
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I don’t think I said that at all.
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Or doesn’t allow itself to cook off in a multi-home-leveling explosion. Gas lines going is never fun.
I’ve lived in places with gas stoves and with electric stoves. I vastly prefer gas stoves. Just open a window or use the exhaust fan. I don’t see a problem. Gas is currently way cheaper than electricity where I live.
Did you not read the article…?
I did read the article. What point are you trying to make? I concede that gas stoves do generate potentially harmful combustion byproducts but in my opinion, adequate ventilation minimizes the health risks.
Ok I had a similar question, but DID read the article.
I was also wondering if using an external-exhaust hood vent helped, because it sounds like it would. You’d think it would pull the NO2 outside and reduce exposure.
Did you? They don’t mention whether or not ventilation mitigates the effects.
This NPR article mentions ventilation:
That’s interesting but it seems like an incomplete answer. I’ve read that it’s very common for people to install a range hood that’s too small. If it’s true that range hoods are often under-sized, then it naturally follows that they would often be ineffective. So I would like to know the answer in terms of a high-end well-designed & /big/ range hood. I would also expect a low hood to be more effective than one installed high above the stove.
I’d definitely be interested in seeing more concrete numbers as well, but I was surprised (perhaps in my ignorance) that harmful chemicals were being produced in any substantial quantity at all. I mean, burning most things has that kind of reaction, but it’s somewhat more obvious when sitting around all evening next to the smoke from a campfire for instance. I just never really thought much about the chemical reaction of ignited propane.
I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of people thought about their stove fans as something to primarily take care of any smoke and some of the smell from cooking, rather than a necessity to clear out toxic fumes like you’d need in a chem lab.
Yeah this article caught me by surprise. Natural gas is naturally odorless so that probably works against awareness.
I tend to be lazy about turning on the loud fans which downgrades the ambiance. But I need to change something because grease cakes up on everything near the oven and on the cabinets. My range hood is also the ventless style, which must be totally useless against the benzine byproduct.
I will certainly put more thought into kitchen design in the future. The gas appliances should probably be in the corner of the room so there are fewer directions to control, and the hood should probably be big, industrial, and vented outside. It’s a shame because I might prefer the gas stove to be in an island layout or at least centrally located.
I was curious about temps, according to this induction gets much hotter than gas. Wouldn’t that be much better for searing?
Gas stoves usually show up in colder places where homes would be heated with gas, and in older cities. 240V electricity was dangerous early on, and homes were usually already hooked up to gas networks for heating.
Nope, that is a myth.
I’ve done plenty of my own testing on several mid range from 200 up to 600 and even a few full units on 250/40/50 circuits. None of them were as hot, in even half the time to get up to 700f especially on a double burner range. The cheaper 1500w portables many times didn’t even make it to 700. Being more efficient is not my concern.
Beyond that, I’m still left with gas for using the oven vs electric, and is more efficient.
Induction stoves are still pretty expensive, and resistance electric stoves suck ass.
Induction stoves get cheaper and cheaper every year.
Also? It is mostly just the old exposed metal coil resistive stoves that were horrible. You know, the one we all had growing up where you had to poke the coil with a fork until it made connection again so that it would heat up.
Pretty much any glass top resistive electric stove (so anything made in the past two decades or so?) is fine. Very easy to clean, much less prone to damage, and gets pretty hot pretty fast. You aren’t getting “wok hei” for all the cantonese stir frying you do but… you aren’t getting that with a gas stove either unless you have an ACTUAL restaurant setup (no, not just the expensive options at the Lowes) which tend to have very specific ventilation requirements too… If you want to go all out with your wok, get an outdoor propane burner.
Now, I do actually think the drawback to resistive heating staying hot is a lot bigger than “just pick up the pot”. Not when I am making a weeknight meal for myself. But when I am cooking a larger meal for a date night or having friends over and am using multiple burners? I don’t really have anywhere to put the pot. But that is also incredibly “first world problems” of “I have too much food”
I actually prefer the coils. The glass-top ones are never as easy to clean as they claim, and the glass between the burner and the pot reduces heat transfer and causes them to heat up even slower. With the coil-type the pot is resting on the heater, which means maximum heat transfer via conduction.
Another problem is that the cooktop stays very hot after you take it off the heat. With gas and induction the heat stops instantly, but I’ve burned a lot of food because I misjudged how long it takes for a resistive burner to cool down. And the glass tops are again worse because they have a lot more thermal mass than a coil.
Induction solves all of these problems, though. Heat is controllable and instant, and the cooktop cools down very quickly.
The glass in-between makes them heat up much faster, it is the whole point actually. It is IR transparent, so only the heating element itself has to heat up to get things started. Then only a bit of insulation (next to no mass) has to heat up to get things to nearly 100 %.
I have also never heard or seen this glass being harder to clean than any other type of stove, which are a pain to clean in comparison.
The glass is definitely more of a pain to clean. It’s easy enough to get stuff off, but visually you can see any streaks or missed corners much more than an enamel stovetop.
Sucks less ass than cancer.
I’ll die of old age waiting for a resistive electric burner to boil water.
I always blame my tools when I have no experience using them.
They’re different. You’ll be fine.
I do have experience with gas, induction, and traditional electric and can say with confidence that cooking on traditional electric sucks ass. Induction is good though and I’d say it’s on par with gas if you have the right pans.
I’d miss my heirloom cast irons hah
Cast iron works fine on induction though
You scratching that across that glass?
Also you can’t lift it.
Fully agree induction is great for 95% of needs.
My ideal kitchen would have both (and does lol), with a big vent and a big window.
Cast iron is perfectly fine on induction. And no you wont scratch the glass with it. And yes you can lift it.
You absolutely can, I’ve done it to my own. There are countless articles and videos showing you can use it, but should be careful.
If you lift it out of the induction field you lose the heating.
For these reasons it isn’t ideal and other pans, with a stationary cooking style are preferred on glass.
Maybe. And typically I don’t lift a pan that’s cooking, even on gas.
Resistance electric stoves can only get to about 1600 degrees. Gas stoves get to well over 3400. You can’t get a good a sear out of resistance electric, and water takes forever to boil.
My next stove is going to be induction, though I will have a propane burner for when I really need to char something.
And I’m sure you’ll be horrified to know that I have a charcoal grill like some kind of caveman.
You use the charcoal grill outside where the fumes easily disperse. A gas stove releases the pollution directly into your living space, where it hangs around. They’re not comparable.
It is getting better, we got ours for a little more than $1,000, but electric stoves are dirt cheap. 1/3rd to 1/2 the price.
Induction stoves are not expensive at all.
It’s just nicer to cook on gas. Electric is a pain in the ass and generally less efficient time-wise. Induction apparently solves a lot of issues, though.
Induction solves all of the issues.
Shit, what one do you have? My family has some stupidly expensive one, and the goddamn electric pilot lights get dirty and fail to click off for about 30-50 seconds.
This is also their second gas stove in about 12 years. I only wanted electric because theirs was such a bitch to deal with all the time. :P
Even old school electric burners typically heat water to boiling faster than gas.
Gas is more responsive, but induction comes close. Some of the new induction burners have fake flames to indicate how high the output is visually.
Well it is “better”, but it isn’t (as this article highlights) better.
Even against an induction stovetop though, it’s only better in some niche situations, otherwise I’d say the induction stovetop is better, especially because it can’t set stuff on fire.
For me it was Climate Town.