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.

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[–] 197 points 2 years ago (71 children)
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    [–] 112 points 2 years ago* (19 children)

    It's like everything is lies or something, that sure is surprising in a world where the only important thing is money. It's like its an inevitable consequence or something. Like we shouldn't have organized our society this way

    fuckin shocking

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  • [–] 49 points 2 years ago (4 children)

    I was told that the free market would naturally remove any bad actors... I guess we just have to deal with half a century of collateral damage before that happens.

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    [–] 79 points 2 years ago* (19 children)

    I hear a lot that gas is cheaper for heating and I took that as the truth for a long time. A while ago I did the math though, and for my house is would have been nearly the same annual power bill if I replaced my 90% gas furnace and water heater with electric units. Although the price of gas is far more economical for heating, there's a monthly gas usage fee that's a flat rate. If you go all electric, you don't pay that, and over the course of a year, I didn't heat enough for the lower gas price to offset the flat fees. If instead of a regular electric furnace and water heater, they were heat pumps, electric would have been much cheaper than gas.

    This certainly would depend on your local prices and weather and how well your house is insulated, but if you need a new furnace, I'd do the math over a year to see if gas is still the most financially attractive option, especially if you can install an air or ground source heat pump.

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  • [–] 18 points 2 years ago (5 children)

    Heat pumps are so stupidly efficient that my coworker didn't believe it, even when I showed him how it worked, lol. They are the SSDs of heating and cooling, particularly ground source ones. I had an apartment with one and loved the $60 summer power bills. God, it was fantastic. $60 for the AC, hot water, gaming PC, washer/dryer/dishwasher, oven, and lights.

    ...And no worries of a gas line leaking or carbon monoxide poisoning.

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    [–] 72 points 2 years ago (72 children)

    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.

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  • [–] 41 points 2 years ago (9 children)

    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.

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    [–] 47 points 2 years ago (34 children)

    It's been time to switch to induction stoves for a long time now, they are basically better in every way that matters.

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  • [–] 44 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (33 children)

    How are they with temperature regulation? I think that's a big holdback for a lot of people. A gas burner gives consistent heat output at the set level, while an electric burner cycles on and off, resulting in a wider temperature range.

    ETA: Wow, WTF? Downvoted for asking a legit question. Are we Reddit now?

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  • [–] 35 points 2 years ago (10 children)

    They're probably more consistent than gas. Provided your cookware isn't moved on the surface, they provide a constant energy output that is a simple linear equation of energy in - losses = energy out. Period. Induction elements "cycle" on and off -- hundreds or thousands of times per second. They don't work like a radiant electric stovetop at all. There is no human perceptible duty cycle.

    Fancier models like Bosch and some of the new GE Profile/Cafe ones can even wirelessly communicate with special cookware that has a temperature sensor built in, and deliver you absolute parametrically controlled temperature output at a specific temperature down to the degree, with computer controlled precision. It doesn't get any better than that.

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  • [–] 17 points 2 years ago

    Induction has instant temperature control, combined with the possibility of having lower temperatures than gas allows for.

    Additionally, there's no temperature leakage into the room, nor any particles from combustion.

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  • [–] 39 points 2 years ago (7 children)

    I wonder if the same levels of pollutants are found in restaurants. Most if not all restaurants use gas stoves. The ventilation systems are usually multiple orders of magnitude better than what a typical household would have available.

    Having worked in a few restaurants, the vent systems are usually placed above the stoves but the vent itself is kind of high up. It’s definitely capturing the fumes from the cooking process itself, but not clear if it’s also capturing the pollutants from the stove while it’s on.

    There definitely has to be some spillage into the kitchen. More than using a laboratory grade ventilation hood but less than the typical gas stove in a typical household.

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    [–] 39 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    According to the American Lung Association, lung cancer diagnoses have risen a startling 84% among women over the past 42 years while dropping 36% among men over the same period. The overall number of cases remains fairly steady.

    [...] Approximately 20% of women diagnosed with lung cancer today are lifelong non-smokers (by contrast, only 1 in 12 men with lung cancer have never smoked).

    [...] These shocking statistics beg the question why?

    "No one knows," says John C. Kucharczuk, MD, Director of the Thoracic Oncology Network of the Abramson Cancer Center at Penn Medicine. "It could be hormonal. It could be attributed to high degrees of exposure to secondhand smoke. Some data suggests that among non-smoking females who develop lung cancer, there are chances of a genetic mutation. At this point, there's no conclusive data."

    From: Penn Medicine

    So... is the mystery behind women's lung cancer solved? Lovely if so (/s).

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    [–] 36 points 2 years ago (6 children)

    "Make no mistake, radical environmentalists want to stop Americans from using natural gas. The Consumer Product Safety Commission’s proposed ban on gas stoves is the latest egregious scaremongering by the Far Left and their Biden administration allies. I am pleased to partner with Senator Manchin in this bipartisan effort to stop the federal government from issuing regulations that put the interests of the Green New Deal before the well-being of American families,” said Senator Cruz.

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    [–] 28 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (14 children)

    Aight. I must be missing something huge here.

    Here's the formula for burning methane:

    CH4 + 2O2 → CO2 + 2H2O

    Are there other chemicals in the gas that don't combust? Or don't combust completely?

    EDIT: Jesus Christ I'm an idiot, and y'all upvoted this?! The end product is water and carbon dioxide. Better than straight methane in the atmosphere, at least in the long term, but damn I'm stupid sometimes.

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  • [–] 35 points 2 years ago (6 children)

    It seems that the main problem is the existence of benzene in the natural gas. It's not an additive; it exists in crude oil and comes through in the final product after cracking and refining. I haven't been able to find anything showing the exact method for which benzene acts as a carcinogen, but there are several studies that show a strong correlation between benzene exposure and leukemia.

    Benzene is also in gasoline, so it's also recommended that you don't spend a lot of time huffing gasoline.

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    [–] 24 points 2 years ago (4 children)

    Is this natural gas or LPG

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  • [–] 21 points 2 years ago* (12 children)

    The interesting part in the NPR article is:

    As the scientific evidence grew over time about the health effects from gas stoves, the industry used a playbook echoing the one that tobacco companies employed for decades to fend off regulation.

    This is the case in each industry from tabacco to at the other end Autism for example. People should do their research and look for the quality of the papers and the COI (conflict of interest).

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  • [–] 34 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    Most people cannot judge the quality of scientific papers, that's what public regulators are for, but they failed the people there.

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    [–] 18 points 2 years ago (6 children)

    can raise levels of cancer-causing benzene above what’s been observed from secondhand smoke.

    Yeah this is fairly concerning, I usually think of benzene as super carcinogenic. They actually limit how much of it can be used in gasoline for that reason.

    I'd probably want to compare benzene content from various sources and consult the OSHA guidelines before saying how bad this is, but there's no doubt in my mind that this decidedly bad. You're getting directly and consistently exposed to the benzene.

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    [–] 18 points 2 years ago* (11 children)

    Is this natural gas, or propane, or both? The article mostly uses just "gas" but does mention natural gas once.

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    [–] 17 points 2 years ago (5 children)

    Laughs hysterically in South African... where we now have no choice but to use gas for almost everything because our electrical grid is collapsing due to IMF-approved neoliberal shitfuckery.

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