Solar Cooking (video)

[Joanne98]

Mr. Grandinetti’s oven can be made for about $21 dollars and here’s the kicker: he is giving it away. He doesn’t want to sell the plans, he wants a company to take it and mass produce it for third world countries so that forests won’t need to be cut down for things like cooking fires. A noble idea indeed. It will be interesting to see if any company, anywhere steps up and takes him up on his offer.

John Grandinetti is a solar contractor out of Honolulu, and the owner of Grand Solar Inc. This isn’t his first foray into the solar cooking/pasteurization field. He also has created similar devices for the purpose of pasteurizing water in the late 90’s for third world installations in Tanzania and Guatemala. http://solarcooking.org/safewater2.htm

sources: http://www.cnn.com/
&
http://www.solarpower-home.com/

http://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2008/05/17/solar-cooking-video/

[havocmom]

1. Thanks for posting. We need to get the simplicity of solar cooking out for more to see

Used to love the solar ovens demonstrated at Earth Day festivities when I lived in Tucson. Solar baked cookies always drew a crowd of impressionable youngsters with open minds. Maybe grassroots alternative power groups could make cookies at some of their programs. Get the minds of the youngsters engaged and it makes an impact. ;)

Thanks for posting this info on a solar stove application. VERY cool. Literally. I want an outdoor summer kitchen. This will help make my case to Havocdad who has spent a lifetime demonstrating possibilities to others. This might make him take up demonstrating solar cooking! Win/Win.

Love what this stove can do for peoples who have to use cook fires and those without safe water!

[cornermouse]

3. They used to have accessory kitchens back in the old days.

My grandmother had a building separate from the house that she did all her canning in.

[havocmom]

4. Yep. And it kept the 'main house' more comfortable in summer, didn't it?

With all the new fangled (and expensive) gas grills everybody is selling, it breaks my heart that simple, economical solar methods are not better known. The market driven lemmings are grilling their children's futures and it is SO unnecessary.

[cornermouse]

5. Sure did.

I think it would gain wider acceptance if it looked more like the cooking "appliances" we're used to.

On a related note, I've been trying to think of a way to minimize this winter's heating bill. I've thought about solar, geo-thermal, or (should I win the lottery :eyes: (yeah right)) a combination of the two. I had a passive solar situation quite a few years ago and liked it a lot except for the fact that I had no view to the south of the house. Do you know anyone that has any experience with geo-thermal?

[havocmom]

7. There are more people going to heat pumps where I life (small town in Montana)

Seems to work well for everybody. The few local businesses have switched to the heat pumps, if they have the space to sink the heat well close by. We have really nasty winters here, and the businesses stay so toasty I generally can't stay long and they are too warm for me.

We went from coal to a state of the art radiator system with a REALLY small tank chamber where the water is heated (electric) House is older, but walls are solid and Havocdad insulated the attic within a month of buying the place. Only real heat loss is the old wooden windows.

We LOVE the heating system. Cost a bit, but we managed. Installation just cost us some time. The controls for the water to and from radiators was planned out for us. Gave the manufacture our house dimensions and room/window configuration and they built the whole pump configuration, mounted onto two 4x4 plywood panels, boxed the sides and shipped. We just had to pop the sides off the crate, move the panels down to the basement (OK, we had to get a younger, stronger friend to help with that step) and then mount them on the wall.

Havocdad joined the brass piping on the two panels, hoisted up the computerized boiler box (that is about 16"x 20"x 6" with the actual water chamber inside being the size of a shoe box, I KID YOU NOT)
Joined the heating box to the pre-configured brass plumbing manifolds, hooked up the water lines from our source and to/from all the radiators (PEX* plumbing materials ROCK) and brought the electric wires to the box.

We are both pushing 60 and not as strong as we used to be. It took time, but it wasn't that tough and the house stays wonderful for less than $400 per winter IN MONTANA! i love how easily I can adjust temps (hot flash years combined with Montana winters makes for some interesting challenges.)

When the conventional water heater goes out, it becomes a holding tank for the cold well water to come up in temp a bit then get heated via a tank-less heater.
There is a solar pump fountain in the garden's near feature. Havocdad has managed to get lots of area ranchers to utilize solar powered well pumps for stock watering tanks. Much cheaper than running electricity to all the huge pastures around here and easy enough for one person to install, hook up.

* Re that PEX plumbing material/method: He was so impressed with the ease/efficiency of that stuff that when I pointed out one of the old piped to the kitchen had finally corroded through and needed replacing, he re-plumbed THE WHOLE HOUSE! No leaks, no trouble, easy to accommodate the problems of retrofitting an old house... COOL!

If we retire to a different location and build, it will be solar with a backup and lots of well placed windows and a cooling tower if I get to build the house :D.

[cornermouse]

8. Thank you. A lot to think about there.

I never thought about a radiator system.

[cornermouse]

2. Now if someone would just put some time into inventing

a better more efficient version of the old rotary push mower. Silly thing doesn't want to cut all types of grasses.

Or alternatively, a dog powered mower. That would work too.

[havocmom]

6. Smaller areas of lawn for starters

ground covers which do not get over a certain height for another. Varieties of lettuces, densely seeded (called French Intensive method by some of us) give you pretty green areas to look at and wonderful food to share. Birds love the lettuce seeds if you let a few seed out ,enough will hit the ground, the next season will be green with little seed augmentation.

Clover is a great green ground cover that doesn't get too tall, doesn't need much (if any) mowing. It fixes nitrogen in the soil which makes other things grow better without as much costly fertilizer. Smells good. Bees love it. Bunnies love it. TOMATOES love it (I put clover under tomato plants when I lived in Tucson, where everyone said it was too brutally hot to grow tomatoes. Cooler soil, better moisture retention, pockets of more humid air due to my green cover meant less hot weather stress on the tomato plants. Nitrogen fixed well at their roots REALLY made 'em happy. And my old cats (as well as neighbor cats) LOVED to rest on the cool clover, which meant... less garden pests without lots of work or more chemicals. Cooler soils also meant more worms, so the birds helped out with pest control. They took a few worms, sure, but they also took all the grubs that had been allowed to populate the soil before I moved in. Within two years, I had OODLES more earthworms and rarely found a bad grub in the soils. Thanks birds!

My mom was the first in town to use a thick carpet of grass we called Korean Grass back then. It was dense, lovely green, shaded the ground so it saved water, was virtually weed-free due to the density of the growth from 'runners' (rhizomes) and it didn't need mowing but maybe once a season, which was a big plus to my hay fever suffering siblings. I believe it is called Zoysia grass now that it is more common in the US. Mom was 40 years ahead of the curve! She put it on a small bank that was hard to hold. Problem solved, beautifully, I might add.

Low growing herbs are good for areas where you don't need a traffic resistant cover. Smell good, attract bees, useful in cooking. Many herbs THRIVE on dryer soils and human neglect.

We have yarrow that is spreading it's self from the flower beds and into the small grassy area we keep. It is the first green in spring where we live. Welcome sight! And Havocdad just mows it along with the little bit of grass. He uses a weed whacker. Much faster, easier for the small lawn and not as harmful.

Now, if I could just figure how to run that whacker off a solar back pack... ;) Personally, I can use my dad's old method for small lawns: Take a big pitcher of iced tea (or a 6 pack) out with some friends and some hand held clippers. It works! It's civilized and the conversations are healthy! Not as much particulate matter for the allergy prone. Do it in the evening and by nightfall, your lawn is mowed and you have caught up with what all your friends have been up to. Memories made of pleasant times may just inspire the youngsters to become life-long gardeners ;)

My parents were really weird, and WAY ahead of their time. I miss them, but not as much when I am outside in the evenings, tending the growing things. :D