Around 600 students from a school in Bambolim participated in a programme where they cooked noodles using solar energy. This was done with the guidance of teachers, aided by institutions including the Goa Energy Development Association. These solar cookers were made with simple materials which works to reduce the cost involved. There was a lot of information that exchanged hands, information that could be used on a widespread basis to help Goa in various ways.
Solar cooking may take a little longer than using gas or other fossil fuels, but the end product is actually far more nutritious than one would imagine. This method of cooking has existed for a long time but has not been adapted by institutions and individuals the way it should have been. The basic fundamental of solar cooking is that of using direct sunlight to heat and cook food. It can also be used to pasteurise food and related products. The obvious question would be, how can solar energy be harnessed to create the required amount of heat to cooking food, like rice, curry or even meat and vegetables. It can, using simple principles like concentrating sunlight and converting light energy into heat energy. There are different types of cookers “ box, parabolic and panel, but all run on the same principles and cook food quite well.
Now this may make sense for a household to cook food occasionally or on a regular basis but these principles can also be used on a much larger scale. Institutions, like orphanages, old age homes, charitable groups, bakeries and even factories, can use this method to cook food for hundreds and thousands of mouths. These either use direct solar power or use that power to create steam that can also be used in cooking.
Tirupati and Shirdi have very popular shrines that use solar technology to cook food, both using parabolic reflectors to create power. In Shirdi, over 20,000 devotees are fed daily and not one bit of gas in used in the making of their food. This power is used for almost nine to ten months, with a wood fired boiler used in the remaining months. In Auroville, the experimental township outside Pondicherry, a massive parabolic solar cooking apparatus called the Auroville Solar Bowl manages to cook food for over 1000 people daily for lunch and dinner too. Incidentally, the Bowl is named so since the research for it had started in Auroville itself in the mid-1980s. The Villager Sun Oven is a box cooker created by a company in the U.S. that has been scaled up for community use and is in use in over 55 countries like Afghanistan, Haiti and parts of Africa in refugee camps and other areas.
Imagine solar energy being used to create mid-day meals for school children across Goa. This is not something that cannot be done without the government’s help but the cost implications are astounding. This is a one-time cost, which can be subsidized and perhaps even made into a loan to these institutions. Not only will be pro rata cost go down but conversely the health quotient of the food will go up.
There are other institutions, from colleges to factories and offices that can benefit from solar cooking. The Goa Energy Development Agency could possibly spearhead this process, which has man benefits, apart from creating a revenue stream for many organisations too. The possibilities are vast, but the time to start is now.
