Solar Household Energy news archive

*November 2011: SHE's founding chairman, Darwin Curtis, is meeting this week with officials at the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Geneva, to brief them on our project to introduce solar cooking in the UNHCR Gaga Refugee Camp in eastern Chad for Sudanese refugees. Details of the project introduction are included in the Annual Report. The second follow-up visit to the camp in July provided encouraging news that the households that received HotPots are using them for every mid-day meal and some evening meals as well. The families reported that their wood usage has dropped by 25-40% and their monthly allotment of wood from UNHCR is now lasting them twice as long. The women no longer have to leave the camp to collect scarce fuelwood and put themselves at risk. The participants recommended that all the families in the camp receive their own HotPots. UNHCR's purpose in contracting this pilot project was so they could determine if they would like to scale it up to include more households and possibly more camps. Solar Household Energy Annual Report: FY 2011
*October 2011: We would like to let you know that the FY 2011 Annual Report is now available. It provides a summary of some of Solar Household Energy's accomplishments during the year ending May 31, 2011. SHE continues to be actively engaged in promoting solar cooking and helping to get it into the hands of those who can benefit from it most. Below is an update on some of the activities introduced in the Annual Report. Louise Meyer, our director of training and field operations, recently returned from a trip to Tilori, a small community in Haiti on the border with the Dominican Republic. As part of a reforestation project of The Nature Conservancy, Solar Household Energy organized and directed the introduction of Global Sun Ovens and Stovetec [fuel-efficient wood stove]]s for 25 Haitian women from Tilori, and five Dominican women who live nearby and trained them in the use. Combining both the solar ovens and the fuel-efficient wood stoves enables healthy cooking practices in all weather conditions and times of day. "It was a surprise to find a great variety of goods being cooked, far more than had been prepared during the training program that preceded this phase," Louise reports. "Judging from the home visits, the Haitian women felt comfortable using their solar ovens, a totally new cooking technology for them," she adds. We look forward to expanding this project to include more families in Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Solar Household Energy Annual Report: FY 2011
*May 2011: Solar Household Energy(SHE) was commissioned to test acceptance of the HotPot solar oven in the Gaga refugee camp in eastern Chad. It shelters 20,000 people from Darfur in Western Sudan. Patrick Fourrier, a French solar cooking expert affiliated with Bolivia Inti Sud Soleil, completed the first phase of the project last month. He will also ensure that local support systems set in place to encourage continued use of the solar ovens are working effectively. Report of the training mission in solar cooking: Gaga Refugee Camp Meanwhile, SHE has begun a cooperative relationship with Grupo Jaragua, a highly respected non-governmental organization in the Dominican Republic, to support a solar cooking initiative. Grupo is aided by a Dominican eco-tourism and solar cooking advocate El Fuego del Sol, which conducts the local assembly and subsidized sale of Sun Oven box cookers in rural communities near the Haitian border. They are also supporting The Nature Conservancy’s office in the Dominican Republic to add the integrated cooking method as a component of their reforestation project in Haiti. SHE is working to expand the solar cooking promotion efforts it undertook in Mexico with the Mexican Fund for the Conservation of Nature (FMCN) begun in 2004. They has also been active in the areas of solar cooking advocacy, research and technology development. On the public education front, SHE founding director Dar Curtis is participating as a contributing member of the Technology and Fuels Working Group of the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves. This alliance of governments, corporations and nonprofits is promoting cleaner cooking solutions than the open cooking fires and inefficient cookstoves used by three billion people around the world. Solar provides the very cleanest cooking of all cookstoves. Read more in the SHE spring update 2011.
*August 2010: - Solar Household Energy
*July 2009: Through the Senegal Solar Cooking Initiative, project partners Solar Household Energy, Inc. (SHE) and Tostan will train and equip 2,000 families with HotPot solar cookers. Dozens of villages are participating in the project, and are sending groups of three representatives to be trained. A point person from each village is selected, and is responsible for conducting local demonstrations, distributing HotPots, answering questions, and offering advice. A regional trainer offers further support as needed. Foods that are solar cooked at the demonstrations include fish, rice, beans, millet porridge, and cakes. By mid-2008, 1,000 HotPots had been distributed in the Thies region and 350 in the Kaolack region. The remaining HotPots are slated for the Touba region.
*July 2009: Solar Household Energy, Inc.’s Richard Stolz reports that 400 HotPot solar cookers were provided to victims of the floods that ravaged the southern state of Tabasco in late 2007. “In addition to the devastation caused to homes, the floods knocked out Tabasco’s electricity and gas distribution plant. As a result, even after flood waters had receded, many residents had no means of cooking food, particularly when firewood was unavailable.” The HotPots were made available by two of Solar Household Energy, Inc.’s partner organizations, the Mexican Fund for the Conservation of Nature, and International Logistics Solutions, which manufactures HotPots in Mexico.
*March 2009: Donate to project online: Solar Cooking to Help Women Affected by War in El Salvador - Global Giving
*November 2008: The Senegalese Ministry of Biofuels and Renewable Energy is entering into an agreement with Solar Household Energy to produce and sell solar cookers locally. "We hope to make solar stoves available in all 11 regions of Senegal," said Abdoulaye Touré, solar energy specialist at the ministry. More information...
*November 2008: In late 2006, Acciónatura, a Spanish NGO, approached SHE about implementing a project in Peru with their Peruvian partner NGO. While they had the funding to buy the HotPots and implement the project, they did not have the solar cooking technical expertise. Therefore, they requested in-country technical solar cooking support from Solar Household Energy (SHE). SHE signed a Terms of Reference with Acciónatura to work in a consortium with Asociación de Ecosistemas Andinos (ECOAN) to conduct a solar cooking project. The solar cooking trainings were launched in mid-April outside of Lucre, Peru (about 30 kilometers from Cuzco). During five separate trainings, 100 women learned solar cooking techniques. Traditional Peruvian dishes, estofada (chicken and potato stew), rice, and baked peaches were cooked. All the women were extremely impressed with the ability of the HotPot to cook traditional food. In the coming months, the women will attend follow-up meetings where they will share solar cooking experiences. Additionally, the women will participate in a work-exchange program. In the work-exchange program, the women will plant trees in a reforestation project, conduct solar cooking demonstrations in their communities, and conduct solar cooking demonstrations at a regional food fair.
*Fall 2008: Fall Quarterly Newsletter 2008
*June 2008: Solar Oven Cooking: A Lucrative Business - News Blaze
*February 2008: SHE has launched two new pilot projects in Guatemala with Fundación Defensores de la Naturaleza and Asociación Kajih-Jel. In conjunction with the two NGOs, SHE conducted solar cooking trainings to 75 women in two rural villages. The women were impressed with the exceptionally good flavor of the chicken stew, rice, and plantains cooked in the HotPot. A micro-credit system will allow participants to amortize HotPot payments over time.
*November 2007: SHE has launched pilot projects with two new Salvadoran NGOs, Unidad Ecológica Salvadoreña (UNES) and Asociación de Lisiados de Guerra de El Salvador (ALGES). The women participating in the program receive a solar cooking training and hold monthly meetings to share solar cooking experience. One group of women participates in a micro-credit payment program. The other group of women participates in a work exchange program: they conduct solar cooking demonstrations in exchange for a HotPot. Additionally, partner organizations hold a technology exchange between local communities to spread the word about solar cooking!
*May 2007: The May issue of House and Garden features an article on solar cooking by Sue Halpern and Bill McKibben. "We are partial to the Solar Household Energy Inc.'s HotPot," the authors wrote. They offered two reasons for their praise: "Buying it supports the work of SHE in less developed regions of the world, especially where forests have been ravaged for cooking fuel, and because it comes with its own cooking pot." The authors stated that solar ovens "haven't reached the mainstream yet," but added that solar cookers "are attracting attention for producing intensely flavored food without match or plug." The article also describes other solar ovens and the use of solar cooking both in the developing world and in the U.S. The article is currently on the magazine's web site
*April 2007: Solar Household Energy partners in El Salvador are currently implementing solar cooking pilot projects that their communities have embraced. More than 100 HotPots have been distributed in the past five months! The majority of women use them for cooking on a daily basis, helping to offset the time and money costs of foraging or paying for wood. Solar Household Energy continues to raise funds for this project with the goal of offering more families the opportunity to own a HotPot. Your donation will directly benefit participants and their families. For details about the program please go to http://www.she-inc.org/art.php?id=62. If you would like to make a donation please go to http://www.she-inc.org/contribute.php. (*Please specify that the donation is for the El Salvador program.)
*January 2007: The International Relations Center, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to provide information and analysis that increase social and economic justice throughout the world, recently cited the HotPot as an example of an effective solar cooker that is both produced and sold in Mexican communities. Mexico is currently working to structure a national training program to help individuals understand the utility of solar and wind power in cost effectiveness for health and the environment. Read more here.
*January 2007: The HotPot will be featured on the Earth Focus TV program in late January. This program highlights the October 2006 Green Festival in Washington, D.C. that promotes a sustainable economy, ecological balance, and social justice. Over 300 exhibitors attended the festival and Solar Household Energy was one of a few organizations highlighted in this program. Please here to see local program times and channels for Earth Focus: Green Festival.
*November 2006: World Bank president hails HotPot solar oven
*The activities conducted and the reports provided by the Florida Solar Energy Center for Solar Household Energy, Inc. while developing the HotPot
*Fall 2006: SHE is in contact with the Agricultural and Rural Development Association (ARA-Ghana). The ARA-Ghana has experimented with the HotPot and considers its quality and design to be very marketable. It is not planning a promotion program.
*June 2006: Solar Household Energy, Inc.'s Director of Programs for Latin America and East Africa, Camille McCarthy, traveled to Kenya and Tanzania to meet with governmental agencies, NGOs, and private sector representatives to explore the feasibility of cooperative solar cooking ventures. Many groups expressed interest in SHE pilot solar cooking projects. SHE expects to conduct initial solar cooking training, marketing and sales projects in Kenya and Tanzania in early 2007.
*Summer 2006: Solar Household Energy's first bulk delivery of HotPots arrived this summer in Mali, West Africa. The container of 1,000 cookers was purchased by a Malian energy services company which has promoted solar cooking in Mali for a number of years and will be a regional distributor of HotPots. To learn more about our West Africa programs, go here.