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International
DEVELOPMENT REPORT - May 13, 2002: Solar Cookers
By Jill Moss
This is the VOA Special English Development
Report.
Millions of people around the world cook their
food over a smoky fire every day. It is often difficult to find wood
for the fire. People who do not have wood must spend large amounts of
money on cooking fuel. However, there is a much easier way to cook food
using energy from the sun.
Solar cookers, or ovens, have been used for
centuries. A Swiss scientist made the first solar oven in seventeen-sixty-seven.
Today, people are using solar cookers in many countries around the world.
People use solar ovens to cook food and to heat drinking water to kill
bacteria and other harmful organisms.
There are three kinds of solar ovens. The first
is a box cooker. It is designed with a special wall that shines or reflects
sunlight into the box. Heat gets trapped under a piece of glass or plastic
covering the top of the cooker. A box oven is effective for slow cooking
of large amounts of food.
The second kind of solar oven is a panel cooker. It includes several
flat walls, or panels, that directly reflect the sun's light onto the
food. The food is inside a separate container of plastic or glass that
traps heat energy. People can build panel cookers quickly and with very
few supplies. They do not cost much. In Kenya, for example, panel cookers
are being manufactured for just two dollars.
The third kind of solar oven is a parabolic
cooker. It has rounded walls that aim sunlight directly into the bottom
of the oven. Food cooks quickly in parabolic ovens. However, these cookers
are hard to make. They must be re-aimed often to follow the sun. Parabolic
cookers can also cause burns and eye injuries if they are not used correctly.
You can make solar ovens from boxes or heavy
paper. They will not catch fire. Paper burns at two-hundred-thirty-two
degrees Celsius. A solar cooker never gets that hot. Solar ovens cook
food at low temperatures over long periods of time. This permits people
to leave food to cook while they do other things.
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