Solar Electric Cookstove - A First Generation, High Efficiency Solar Electric Cooking Device Prototype

Abstract

Nowadays, the number of people without access to electricity is just below 1 billion. However, roughly 700 million people predominantly in rural communities in sub-Saharan Africa and developing Asia are projected to continue without electricity by 2040. In addition, roughly 1.68 billion people do not have access to clean cooking in Sub-Saharan Africa and India. Improved solar thermal cooking systems have been proposed as potential solutions to provide access to clean cooking in these communities, although their success has been limited, due to their constraints. This paper presents the design of a solar electric cookstove, which combines an off-grid photovoltaic (PV) system with a low energy demand electric cooking appliance. The challenges of traditional solar thermal cooking systems can be overcome with this design. Also, the PV system used to power the cookstove can be used to supply other low demand residential electric loads, such as energy-efficient light bulbs and mobile phones, among other smaller and efficient appliances. The implementation of this solution has the potential to significantly contribute towards the goal of reducing the reliance on traditional biomass use as cooking fuel.