ignition that activated the flame on the burner after a small delay to prime the flame. The gas smell alerted the family. After the second time, they pulled the knobs on the front. I had gas ranges at home too; it was great when the power was out and one could still do more than make coffee in a percolator. In fact, I remember making chocolate-chip cookies by flashlight in the gas range during a wicked summer storm that had zapped the electric at a nearby power station/transformer at night. That calmed down and distracted the terrified kids. We also humidified by bowl near the registers with the gas/forced air furnace system during the winter.

Have to say, though, I love our all-electric townhouse apartment; the lines are underground and we seldom have a long outage. The longest outage was when the dry but wicked winds of Ike came through and we had power in about a little over an hour. The rest of the city was still chopping up fallen tree limbs for three days so they could find and repair the downed poles and lines and using gas grills to cook their thawed foods and camping coolers and lanterns before power was restored.

southern county gas replaced the appliances w no pilot ones . flash foreward to where i am now in a all electric apartment. 2nd floor . when the power goes out (sometimes 3 days hasnt done that in a while btw.)the elevator goes out and cant cook. so i have foods that i dont need to cook. we have an electric range . the oven part dosent bother me , but, the curley q elements do. thats 220 volts exposed . eek. if we get new stoves id rather have the flat kind .

Making pizzas.
I was used to pilot light ovens. When I went to preheat it and realized it wasn't on, I reached in with a match.
For several minutes I stood there with a burnt-out match, drenched in tomato sauce, saying "Jesus Christ!" over and over. Blew the top off the range.
All quickly fixable and no injuries, but it taught me to respect gas.
Despite this, I greatly preferred cooking with a flame over resistive electric, which is slow to react and control the temperature. Then I discovered the inductive hot plate, and went all-electric. Spoiled on electric now.

about 20 years ago I noticed that modern gas ovens don't use pilot lights. They have an electric coil which stays glowing hot, hot enough to light the gas and keep it ignited. I thought this was a silly design, because it must use a kilowatt of elec the whole time the oven is on - you might as well use elec heat. Not to mention the fact that they burn out and need repair after a few years.
Pilot light ovens were great for making yogurt and raising bread, a good warm temp constantly. Losing that convenience is a small adjustment to make.

Camp stoves are a good investment for areas prone to power loss. Gas fuel or Sterno. Sometimes you really want a bowl of something hot.

Yeah, it was a fortunate lesson, fortunate that there were no injuries or damage. And humbling.

But a stove in the kitchen is better electric, until of course the power going out. But as batteries continue to get more powerful and cheaper it is worth 10 more years of occasional hardship to reduce methane leaking as much as possible. Our stove is gas but pilot free so we turn the shutoff behind after dinner until morning tea, stoves leak the knobs aren't fully tight.

...the use of dangerous natural gas.

(It is the use of dangerous natural gas that has led to the decline of coal in the US, where the general population is oblivious to the fact that, worldwide, the use of coal is increasing, not decreasing.)

Of course, people in the US like to lie to themselves and each other by making the very disingenuous claim that electricity is "green," which it isn't pretty much anywhere in this whole damned country other than a few rural or semirural areas.

The carbon intensity of the US:



The key to the colors is obviated by passing the cursor over them at the Electricity Map link.

The fact is that the United States while it may have substituted much coal with dangerous natural gas, still burns huge amounts of coal while we all wait, like Godot, for so called "renewable energy" to lead to the elimination of coal, which it can't or won't, because coal is, while extremely dirty, reliable and the materially unsustainable so called "renewable energy" isn't. Like that coal dependent hellhole Germany, if the access to gas declines or disappears, the US will burn coal, and in effect, every electric stove will become a coal stove.

... as people replace gas furnaces and water heaters with modern heat pumps.

If gas is used primarily to cook with, and not for heating, residential gas distribution will become unprofitable. I can easily imagine a future where residential gas distribution systems are abandoned forcing people who insist on cooking with gas to buy it in bottles. Most people won't bother, especially if energy companies subsidize the installation of inductive stove tops.

This bottled gas people cook with might not be propane or butane. It could be dimethyl ether that's synthesized from carbon dioxide using nuclear power.

My wife is a "cooking with gas" person who insisted we replace our failing contractor's special gas range with a new gas range, even though I do 90% or more of the cooking in our house. I almost bought an inductive range without consulting her, but wasn't willing to face her wrath. Near as I can tell "cooking with gas" is a religious belief. My brother who is has owned restaurants and worked as a cook professionally also insists on gas. He has a huge antique gas range in his own kitchen that's all black iron and nickel and weighs as much as a small car.