Design, Construction and Performance Evaluation of Solar Cookers

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 2010

International Journal of Engineering and Technology, 2017

This paper presents the performance testing and promotion of solar cooking in Republic of Djibouti. Djibouti shows tremendous solar potential, therefore, solar cooking technology is as a solution to reduce energy requirements and environmental degradation. The Global Horizontal Irradiance (GHI) is 4.7-7.3 kWh per square meter per day (m 2 / day) throughout most of the country. The thermal performance parameters, first figure of merit (F 1), second figure of merit (F 2) and standard cooking power (P adj) suggested by Bureau of Indian Standard for solar cookers, have been evaluated by experimental studies. It is found that solar cooker is of A grade. Also comparative analysis to literature findings has been investigated to prove the thermal efficiency of proposal solar cooker. The experimental results obtained for thermal performance show that the solar cooker is capable of cooking a variety of foods easily under Djiboutian climate. Keyword-Solar cooker, Figure of merit, Rural population, Adjusted cooking power, Thermal performance I. INTRODUCTION In the developing country, energy access is the major problem. The energy demands are increasing sharply. Due to this reason, the people around the world are switching to renewable energy sources. Over one third of the world's population still uses solid biomass for cooking, lighting, and/or heating, causing serious problems with respiratory health and deforestation [1]. In Djibouti, a large number of people live in rural areas. Wood, charcoal and kerosene are main cooking source for them which result in deforestation and environmental pollution. Fortunately, Djibouti possess ample amount of solar radiation and this offers solar cooking as one of the most attractive options. Solar cookers have a long history dating back almost to 18 th century. According to B. Halacy and C. Halacy [2], the first experiments on solar cookers were carried out by a German Physicist named Tschirnhausen (1651-1708). Then the first solar furnace was fabricated by naturalist George Louis Leclere Buffon (1707-1788). But Nicholas de Saussure (1740-1799) was first in the world to use solar box for cooking. And in 1767, French-Swiss Physicist Horace de Saussure attempted to cook food via solar energy. He constructed a miniature greenhouse with 5 layers of glass boxes turned upside down on a black table and reported cooking fruit [3]. In this paper, we have studied and tested the solar cookers funded by Environmental Global Fund in its environmental micro-financing program. This research integrates the project of the environmental protection framework initiated by the Ministry of Environment and Djiboutian Agency for the Social Development. The main objective of this present work is to evaluate the thermal performance of the solar cooker under Djiboutian climate, using the standard procedure established by Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) for testing solar cooker. The first part of this research concentrated on the climate analysis and energy consumption context in Djibouti.

Renewable Energy, 1998

Cooking energy represents the main energy consumption in most of the African Sahel countries. As the main fuel of cooking in these countries is wood. this led to the problem of deforestation in this area. On the way of thinking to solve this problem, a solar cooker was designed constructed and field tested . The main criteria followed in the design was to develop a simple to construct, simple to use, and simple maintenance solar cooker . A simple wooden, hot box, with one reflector solar cooker was designed and several demonstration units were fabricated. The units were field tested and showed acceptable performance . Maximum inner temperature of the units reached 160 °C under field conditions ofGiza, Egypt (30 °N ). Different foods were cooked successfully such as rice, meat, fish, beans .... etc. The time of cooking ranged from 1 to 2.5 hr.

2022

The environmental impact and associated health issues have been seen as a significant global challenge. Efforts have been made to make solar cookers efficient to reduce the health risk and environmental impact of traditional cooking energy supplies used in rural areas. The solar cookers effectiveness for cooking purposes must be assessed in a specific area before installation. In essence, this paper assesses the experimental efficiency of German Scheffler, small mirror pieces, and aluminum foil based solar cookers. The solar cookers performances are evaluated at international standards by analyzing the figure of merits such as standard cooking power, sensible heating time, and exergy efficiency by using 1.7652 kg water and 1-liter oil as a heating material. The regression analysis is also performed to observe experimental data compliance with regression line. The time required to attain a water temperature of 95˚C by German Scheffler and small mirror pieces is 25 min and 1 hour with their exergy efficiency of 48.51% and 19.16% respectively, while the aluminum foil solar cooker achieves maximum water temperature of 74˚C within 2 hours and 5 minutes with 13.47% exergy efficiency. Similarly, the highest oil temperature of 275˚C is observed for the German Scheffler solar cooker. From experimental and regression results, it is revealed that German Scheffler possesses more cooking power relative to other solar cookers and their performances are highly dependent on following factors such as solar radiations, ambient temperature, environment (dust particles concentration and wind speed), radiation reflective material, aperture area, and heat losses respectively.

Polish Journal of Environmental Studies

Many sun-rich countries of the world use solar energy for their daily cooking needs. Solar cooking is one of the most economical methods that decreases deforestation. The main purpose of this research is to find the different thermal performance parameters of a solar box cooker in the climatic conditions of Quetta, Pakistan (Latitude +30.21 and Longitude +67.02). The tested parameters were F 1 and F 2 , cooking power, standard cooking power and efficiency η. Experimental tests were conducted to find the value of these parameters. The value of F 1 and F 2 were found to be 0.12 and 0.58, respectively. Values of cooking power and standard cooking power were 40.33 and 37.06, respectively. A regression correlation was plotted graphically between standard cooking power P s and temperature difference ΔT. The correlation coefficient was calculated as 0.80. The overall efficiency of the box-type solar cooker was 29.81%. The result shows that the climatic conditions of this area are suitable for solar cooking.

2015

Different categories of solar cooker ranging from concentrator types, solar ovens, box type cookers with or without reflectors and indirect solar cookers have been designed and tested in Nigeria. The uses of different designs of solar cookers have not become acceptable in the rural areas due to number of reasons. It is either they are too expensive for individual family to afford or they are yet to be practically known. In view of these shortcomings, this paper presents thermal performance of low cost reflectors based solar box cooker implemented in Ile-Ife, Nigeria. The cooker was constructed with locally available materials. The thermal performance of the cooker in terms of figures of merits and cooker efficiency was evaluated based on Indian Standard (IS 13429:2000). Results of field evaluation show maximum insolation of 520 W/m 2 at 2.00 pm and minimum of 246 W/m 2 at 11.00 am. The average solar radiation and ambient temperature observed during the test periods were 403 W/m 2 and 40°C respectively. The water temperature values between 60 and 67°C were observed at insolation values between 398 and 520 W/m 2. These occur between the hour of 1:20 pm and 4:00 pm with the highest water temperature of 67°C at 3.00 pm. The performance of the cooker in terms of first figure of merit, second figure of merit and thermal efficiency show that the cooker compare favourably well with international standard. The cooker has a better heat retention capacity when compared with others found in the literature. The experimental results obtained for thermal performance of the cooker demonstrated its suitability for cooking even during fluctuating weather conditions.

International Journal of Current Microbiology and Applied Sciences, 2020

Solar Energy, 2020

This research paper demonstrates the importance of Parabolic Solar Cooker both for developing countries and for refugee camps. This cooker's main purpose was to concentrate the solar radiation and convert it to heat using different reflective materials. Some essential factors were considered as the surface of the reflector must be smooth and shiny, and control (loading, tracking, temperature sensing.) variables and uncontrolled (wind, ambient temperature) variables also need to consider. Several Parabolic Solar cookers had designed various reflective materials such as Stainless Steel, Aluminum Foil, and Mylar Tape. Additionally, multiple testing had done with those Parabolic Solar cookers. Besides, in this research three different forms of temperature were measured: Concentrating surface temperature, vessel temperature, and water temperature. The notable success of this research work was the third design. The third design was implemented with Mylar Tape as a reflective material. Boiled Rice, Fried egg and Fried potato had cooked within a short period with the third design. Firstly, stainless steel as a reflective material was used to construct the first prototype. Moreover, 58.2°C maximum water temperature was achieved from the first prototype. After that, the second prototype was used aluminum foil as reflective material. Besides, 74.5°C maximum water temperature was achieved from the second prototype. Finally, the third prototype was used Mylar tape as a reflective material. Alongside, 74.5°C maximum water temperature was achieved from the third prototype. Moreover, in the wood we got 239°C as well as in paper we got 105.4°C.

2011

A small review on the box type solar cooker applications and its designs given here. Two designs of cookers were tested. The first type has a painted black base and second type has a pained black with coal. These designs were examined under two modes of operations: at fixed position and on tracking system. The cooker at a fixed position had recorded thermal efficiencies ranging from 25.2 % to a sharp peak of 53.8% at the maximum solar intensity of the day around 12-13 pm with an average overall efficiency around 32.3%. Whereas, cooker with black coal pained installed on a sun tracking system gave higher water and pot temperatures, and thermal efficiency ranged from 28% to 62.1% with an average overall efficiency around 43.8 %. Cookers installed on sun tracking system had the advantage of maintaining a higher as well as closer range of thermal efficiencies through the daylight than the ones at fixed positions.

International Journal of Innovative Research and Development

A constructed solar box cooker with aperture area of 0.408 m 2 has been evaluated under the climatic conditions of MAUTECH, Yola using the stagnation and cooking test techniques. With ‫ܨ‬ ଵ ≅ 0.12 and ‫ܨ‬ ଶ ≅ 0.19 the solar box cooker was found suitable for cooking at the location. It can offer 27 J of heat under average solar radiation intensities ≥ 750 Wm -2 to the cooking content per second. Though it takes longer time to cook, it may be used as an outside kitchen cooking alternative for a patient house wife.