solar kitchen

Most people, to some extent, are naturally entrepreneurial. In fact, I have yet to meet the person who doesn’t enjoy making money or at least saving money. Solar cooking not only achieves this naturally, but by the very nature of cooking with the sun, it perpetuates the concept of cooking without using electricity and thus reinforces built-in opportunity cost savings.

There is an unavoidable upfront cost of buying a commercial solar cooker or buying the raw materials to build your own solar cooker, but that is a one-time cost that is easily recouped assuming you cook a reasonable proportion of your meals in a solar oven. A fun approach to this would be to cook most of your weekend meals in the solar oven when you’re not under the weekend time pressures associated with work and home deadlines.

While one will never become a millionaire this way, it is exciting to realize that cooking with the sun actually puts money back in your pocket and comes with the added bonus of an absolutely zero carbon footprint.

Solar cooking on the weekend using only solar energy can also become a whole family activity in which even children get involved, provided of course there is proper supervision.

Budding solar chefs can sometimes underestimate the admittedly limited, but real, inherent dangers associated with solar cooking. A solar oven left to stand in direct sunlight can develop extremely high internal temperatures and inexperienced users can be inadvertently burned by accidentally touching the cooktop’s internal reflective material.

Similarly, a parabolic reflector left unattended and uncovered in full sunlight can concentrate and reflect sunlight onto any form of wooden structure in the vicinity of the reflector, thus causing a fire.

If the ultimate business model is to have zero fixed costs and a fully variable cost structure, then solar cooking and solar ovens have to be a prime example, albeit on a small household scale.

After all, free cooking with no associated electricity cost has to be the latest form of cheap solar power and a no-brainer. While it is true that you do not have the same level of control and predictability that you have with a conventional oven or cooktop, you do have numerous benefits with solar cooking with a solar oven including, but not limited to:

Inexpensive: No electricity required in the first place and for most. There is a small one-time cost to purchasing the solar cooker and thereafter there are no overhead cost implications.

Skill: Most solar cookers are easy to use and do not require an advanced level of technical skill. A basic education on how to use the solar cooker is necessary and thereafter the user can use the cooker day after day on a regular basis.

Slow cooking concept: The dynamic process is slow cooking. Food is cooked properly for a long time, and due to low heat flux dynamics, food does not burn. Despite longer cooking times compared to conventional cooking, solar-cooked foods retain and preserve the food’s vitamin and nutrient content as well as or better than foods cooked using conventional methods.

Wikipedia describes the advantages of slow cooking as: “Cheaper cuts of meat with connective tissue and lean muscle fiber are suitable for stewing, and more flavorful than stews with expensive cuts, as slow cooking will soften the connective tissue without toughening it up.” the muscle. Slow cooking leaves gelatinized tissue in the meat, so it may be advantageous to start with a richer liquid. The low temperature of slow cooking makes it impossible to burn food even if cooked too long… “

No fuel requirement: The raw material is sunlight which is abundant and free (although not necessarily always available). As a consequence, there is no fuel requirement that reduces and potentially eliminates deforestation and related health disadvantages such as smoke pollution.

It is not necessary to walk long distances to find and recover fuel, for example, wood. It has recently been extrapolated that a solar cooker saves approximately the equivalent of 2 tons of trees per year.

In terms of the macro environment, a greater reliance on sunlight and less reliance on fuel combustion translates into a reduced greenhouse effect, less reliance on fossil fuels, a better contribution to global warming reduction, and less carbon footprint burden.

Another specific benefit of solar cooking is the reduction of black carbon emissions. Black carbon is a consequence of the incomplete combustion of fossil fuels and biofuels and is particularly prevalent in Africa as a consequence of open fires. Black carbon emissions are postulated to be disproportionately harmful to the greenhouse effect and particularly serious to human health.

Water sterilization and pasteurization: Water can be heated and pasteurized using a solar oven, dramatically reducing the risk and occurrence of waterborne diseases such as cholera, enteritis, and diarrhea. In areas where communities live in close proximity to water, using a solar still, whether it’s a home model or a commercial model, can generate pure, unpolluted water on a daily basis.

Portability: Some of the brands of solar cookers, for example box and panel solar cookers, are lightweight and can be easily folded into a compact unit and transported. In many cases, solar cookers weigh less than 11 pounds (5 kg).

Longevity – Most commercial solar cookers are assembled and constructed of sturdy materials that, if properly cleaned and maintained, should last for an extended period of time. An added benefit is that most kitchens do not have a multitude of moving parts or interconnected components, so maintenance requirements are minimal.