Solar cooker wins climate change challenge
Shannon Carr-Shand, 9th April 2009, Climate change, Innovation
In the end it was the simplicity of a cheap solar cooking stove which captured the public’s imagination in the FT Climate Change Challenge – our global competition to find the best innovations to tackle climate change.
The Kyoto Box today won the first prize of $75,000, sponsored by technology giant HP. This will allow it to conduct mass trials of the technology in 10 countries, including South Africa, India and Indonesia. You can read more about it here.
This announcement is the culmination of a five-month search to find and reward the most innovative solutions to climate change. The final shortlist, selected by our panel of business leaders and climate change experts, reflects the many levels on which business and civil society need to take action to address climate change.
Our finalists offered ways to reduce new emissions from agriculture, transportation and air conditioning – all critical areas when you consider the Stern Review estimates that agriculture is responsible for 14% of global greenhouse gas emissions, the transport sector 14%, and buildings 8%.
At the other end of the spectrum, another of our finalists, Carbonscape, proposes to reduce current atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases, offering an efficient method of fixing carbon dioxide in wood and other organic material as charcoal which can be locked away.
It is heartening to see that the entries drew inspiration from across the scientific world – from biomimicry to the laws of thermal dynamics.
History tells us that new innovation can flourish in an economic downturn as a renewed focus on the competitive edge creates the space for innovators to put their theories into practice. This may be true, but to develop innovations that tackle climate change and are commensurate with the scale of this challenge will require focused financial support. Existing and new technologies will need to be commercialised if they are to reach the tipping point at which they can make a real contribution.
Over the course of the competition, approximately 23,000 people visited the challenge homepage – engaging in the debate on how innovation can tackle climate change, and getting an insight into the new markets that will be created in the move towards a low-carbon economy. With the need to reduce emissions growing ever more urgent, lets hope that this debate has inspired new innovators to focus on tackling climate change.
Read more about the competition and the winner.
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Comments
Forum for the Future welcomes constructive comment and differing opinions. We reserve the right not to publish messages which we believe are commercial or designed to disrupt discussion. We moderate comments according to these guidelines.
Lessons from Mexico
At its core, the idea of solar-powered cookers is a good one. However, it's the implementation in the 'developing world' where things go awry. There was a big push for solar ovens in Mexico the past few years but at the end of the day, the model is far too expensive and communities unconvinced. Part of the problem was that the consultants arrived during the rainy season. The first introduction was a lousy one. We'll keep an eye on your efforts and wish you well. Solar cooking is a blast!
Like most of the previous
Like most of the previous comments I concur: yes, it's a great idea that should get promoted and used more but it's quite far fetched that such a huge prize is awarded to this idea.
Scouts all over the world have been learning to make and use a solar box for 100 odd years! As mentioned by several other comments - it's quite fascinating that the judging panel doesn't seem to have had internet access for decent research. Scouts have not only been working with solar cookers (and other energy friendly cooking methods) for so many years (from as young as 7-8 years old) but they've also learned how to make it with cheap materials, preferably recyclable. Companies who want to spend money on prizes and development of products might want to do better research into either origins of a product or true originality.
Beware
I just came from their polished website, with a complete catalog of their products, including prices, but offering no way to buy any of their products. I searched for their products on line, and dead ended here at this forum, which seems to be the only place they are meantioned.
http://www.kyoto-energy.com/kyoto-box.html
I get it now. They are not a real company. They just created the appearance of one to win the prize.
That's too bad, because they produce the only solar oven I've seen so far that you can turn upside down and wear as a hat, to stop the space aliens from reading your mind.
Lets move on...
I think the fact that the world is GETTING people to think outside the box here is great. We need to start being more proactive in our search for using less energy or at least utilizing renewable energy resources. Yes this was a previous invention - but comeon guys, I implore you to do something better and to create an invention that will be innovative in design and creativity.
More of should be encouraged
It's nice that HP is going to make R&D in the field of Solar cooker as more of them should be encouraged, they are environmental friendly too. Hope the research ends in a big success and enormous life will be benefit from it.
Re Climate Change Competition winner - clarification
Thanks for all the comments regarding the Kyoto Box winning the FT Climate Challenge Competition. There have been a few posts pointing out that the solar-powered oven is not a new idea. The point of the competition was not to reward a eureka moment but to help an innovative approach to climate change reach the market. As Kyoto Energy founder and competition-winner Jon Bøhmer acknowledges in his company literature and on his application, the concept of solar cooking has been around since the eighteenth century.
There are other versions of solar cookers available on the web and there are also detailed explanations of how to make a version of a similar device. What distinguishes this approach is that the cooker will be mass-produced cheaply in existing factories, the finished item is to be flat-packed for bulk transportation to end users and is extremely cheap at $6.
The $75,000 prize money is going to enable Kyoto Energy to test durable, plastic versions of the cooker with 10,000 people currently burning fossil fuels to clean their water and heat their food. The expert judges and the thousands of members of the public who voted for the Kyoto Box agreed that this simple idea offered the best opportunity amongst the five short-listed ideas for an innovation to help tackle climate change on a big scale.
Please see the press release and our site for more information on the competition and its objectives.
Shannon Carr-Shand, Forum for the Future
The Kyoto Box is IDENTICAL to existing models
What you seem to be ignoring, is that there is absolutely NOTHING new in the Kyoto Box "design". Flattening a box isn't exactly a break-through. Mass producing solar cookers is not new.
Can you name a single element of this "winning" design that is actually innovative?
One can only conclude that the judges of this contest haven't heard about this thing called the "web", and that in less than 2 minutes you could find dozens of designs more innovative than the one that "stole" the stage.
Your explanation
Again thanks for bringing all of this world wide attention to this wonderful appropriate technology called solar cookers. And thanks for the "clarification". It is unfortunate that that explanation was not included in your press releases regarding the $75,000 prize. Frankly, as the letters that you have received attest, Forum for the Future is the subject of a good deal of derision among experienced solar cooks around the world. Much of that derision would have been avoided with a more complete press release.
You claim that "What distinguishes this approach is that the cooker will be mass-produced cheaply in existing factories, the finished item is to be flat-packed for bulk transportation..."
For completeness I must point out that I have two cardboard box solar cookers that were manufactured in existing factories with the finished product flat-packed for easy transport. These I purchased about 10 years ago.
Full plans for a solar oven
Full plans for a solar oven that is very similiar to this man's invention found on Solar Cooker International's site:
http://solarcooking.wikia.com/wiki/Minimum_Solar_Box_Cooker
This is an excellent resource for those interested - with many other designs of solar cookers. From the site...
"Solar Cookers International (SCI) spreads solar cooking awareness and skills worldwide, particularly in areas with plentiful sunshine and diminishing sources of cooking fuel. Since its founding in 1987, SCI has enabled 30,000 families in Africa to cook with the sun's energy, freeing women and children from the burdens of gathering firewood and carrying it for miles."
Solar Cooker not a new idea
I find it astonishing that someone can win a innovation/design competition with a device that was invented years ago by someone else and that has been in use around the world by tens of thousands of people, prevented massive deforrestation, reduced CO2 emissions amd improved thousands of lives already.
Let's hope that the organisers, sponsors and the winner get their act together and build on the massive effort and good work already done by countless volunteers around the world largely thought the coordination efforts of Solar cookers International. These are the people and networks who really should be supported in their continuing efforts to promote this technology and improve the world
MOC
Solar Cooker Winner
As one who has been solar cooking for 19 years, I am pleased to see all of the excitement generated by declaring the Kyoto Cooker as the winner of the Climate Change Challenge.
As one who believes that The Forum For the Future should be both honest and well informed, I am totally appalled that the Kyoto Box is presented as something new.
Solar box cookers with essentially the same design as the Kyoto Cooker has been around for at least 3 decades. I have made them myself and I have purchased them from Solar Cookers International which at one time called itself Solar Box Cookers International.
I also know that a decade or so ago there were radio programs in Kenya (the home of Mr. Bohner) about solar cooking and solar cookers like that of Mr. Bohner. As recently as two months ago there were at least two major solar cooking projects going on in Kenya outside of Mr. Bohner's work.
Solar cooking is great. Getting publicity for solar cooking is great. It even is ok to grant Mr. Bohner $75k so that he can attempt to spread this wonderful concept. However, the Forum is either willfully ignorant or intentially misleading the public with the claim that the Kyoto Box is some new great invention. Simply by googleing Solar Cookers you could have found 1million articles. The first several of which give a wealth of information contradicting the claims of invention by Mr. Bohner.
Sincerely,
A Friend of Solar Cooking
I'd love to see this for sale in camp stores in the United State
I would love to see this same device go on sale in camping stores (or any stores for that matter, like an x-mart) in the United States.
It's a similar idea to mass manufacturing a solar space heater on my website, plans are all over, but why not start making and selling them someone? ( you can check out my website at http://greenideas.webhop.biz )
Why was a "borrowed" idea awarded the prize?
If the idea was to encourage innovation, then this contest failed utterly.
The solar box cooker was patented in 1980 by Barbara Kerr and Sherry Cole. There is an entire book, "The Expanding World of Solar Box Cookers" dedicated to the topic (ISBN 0-9632674-0-X) The design, and many variations, are posted all over the net.
This is not something hard to research.
Type "solar box cooker" into google, and item #1 will contain dozens of plans for cookers, many similar, and item #3 will contain an exact plan for a cooker made from cardboard boxes.
Were the judges disallowed internet connections? Or was original effort not a consideration? I can't help but think there were 299 contestants that were denied an opportunity to be awarded for true original thought.
For that matter, did the judges even test his model? Or did they take it on faith that it would work? Based on over 6 years experience cooking with the sun, typically 180 days a year, I suspect that this design, with the reflectors flapping in the wind, will be a poor performer.
The experience of NGOs in the past has been that when solar cookers are poor performers, they end up as kindling.
I can't help but think that the people at FT would spend more time researching an investment in a lemonade stand than the consideration given this project.
The "Solar Cooker"
The winning entry "Solar Cooker", is indeed an excellent, inexpensive and easy example of how to reduce emissions, while providing healthy meals for the world's people.
So much so in fact, the Boy Scouts of America have been training their Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts to "build" portable ovens using nothing more than a cardboard box and tin or aluminium foil, for the last 90 years!
Seems to me, a quick read through the Boy Scout Handbook would yield a wealth of "Leave No Trace" guidelines for the world to follow. These guidelines were established in 1907 and continue to be a beacon of education and training in many nations. Youth from all over the world are introduced to the skills necessary to make ethical choices, and to become self-reliant members of their families and communities, while being responsible for and responsive to their environments.
Ellen Pabst von Ohain
Scoutmaster
Troop 21, Boy Scouts of America
Munich, Germany
You gave someone 75,000
You gave someone 75,000 dollars for giving you the idea for a box with aluminum foil in it? I'm fairly sure that we were taught how to do that in boy scouts...when we were like 8. Have people really become this disconnected from the world they live in?
It's no wonder people set themselves on fire in wal-mart parking lots these days...
http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2009/02/wal-mart-worker-immolates-sel...
cooker not new
You are aware that solar box cookers have been around for decades and there there is a worldwide network, including in Nairobi, dedicated to promoting their use.
Solar Cooker
Such simple and innovative gadgets, which could be made with cheap or waste materials will be a boon to world's poor. However, in the interest of protecting the environment, these devices should be used by as many as possible, irrespective of their status in society. Many more such ideas should be put forward and proper encouragement should be given by people and governments.
1st prize for an 'Invention' that's been around over 15 years!
Please. The very design that Mr. Bohmer 'invented' has been kicking around for at LEAST 15 years (that's how long ago we received a copy from some friends who worked in Zaire). Even now, any child can go to the Internet and find the likes of:
http://solarcooking.wikia.com/wiki/Minimum_Solar_Box_Cooker
http://www.terra.org/html/s/sol/cocina/directorio/fichaen.php?id=1
(and dozens of others)
It leaves me speechless that someone would be given a huge cash prize for such a blatant appropriation of another person's design, especially one that is fully in the public domain.
Thanks for listening,
David
Great idea, but no new
I can not deny that it is a great idea. However, it is nothing new. I have seen the same thing years ago in sciences fair in high schools. Every year there is at least one solar furnace like this in high school science fairs. There is one next week in San Gabriel High School, Quito Ecuador.
Jon Bohmer did not invent the solar oven
Simple solar ovens are commercially available. Here is a link to a leading company in the field: http://www.solarovens.org/ I was shocked when Andrew Mattina, the bass player of our solar-powered band Solar Punch, informed me of Jon Bohmer winning the FT Climate Change Challenge. Where I applaud all climate-solution efforts, I need to point out that Jon Bohmer's "innovation" is not a new innovation. If such devices are already commercially available, the innovation has already occurred. If the judges of this FT Climate Change Challenge had simply done a Google search using the terms (simple solar oven cardboard box), they would have found an array of publicized designs and explanations that parallel what Jon Bohmer has presented. I mention all this because I feel the FT Climate Change Challenge selected an innappropriate winner. This is unfortunate, because I am sure there were other contestants with true innovations, who are more deserving of the $75,000 first prize and the recognition. Regards, Alan Bigelow, Ph.D.
When will these be available in the USA?
Do you have plans to market a more durable version of this device here in the USA? There are lots of us in more "developed" countries who would like to have a sun oven like this. You could use the extra profits to make more of them for free/cheap distribution in Africa.
Thanks
Sean
Lots of solar cookers like this available - including diy models
http://solarcooking.org/
Hope that helps!