75 Green Businesses You Can Start to Make Money and Make a Difference. Glenn Croston
Cooking is universal. People everywhere cook, even if the foods they cook are vastly different. Every day in hundreds of millions of homes, food is prepared on stoves burning wood, dung, charcoal, coal, and other biomass. Burning wood for cooking in regions where wood is not abundant leads to further deforestation, long walks, and great expense for those without money to spare. Eco-entrepreneurs who encourage better ways of cooking are solving multiple problems at once.
Cooking with wood or other biomass is bad for the environment and for the health of millions. The smoke from indoor traditional cookstoves leads to respiratory diseases killing 1.6 million worldwide (WHO World Health Report, 2002). There is also a significant risk of fire in cramped living areas. In urban areas, cookstoves contribute to pollution and perhaps even climate change. Each cookstove is small, but with billions of them the smoke becomes a significant problem.
A variety of organizations have worked to bring cooking alternatives to the developing world, including Africa, India, Central and South America, as well as China. More efficient cookstoves have achieved some success, with hundreds of thousands of new stoves in Africa and millions of stoves deployed in China. These stoves still require biomass for cooking, but direct more of the produced heat to the food, and burn the fuel more efficiently with less carbon monoxide and smoke in the home.
That said, solar cookers are a cleaner way to go. Reflecting sunlight onto a small surface, they focus enough heat to cook food or heat up water. By avoiding the need for fuel, solar cookstoves save money that can be spent on education or other fundamentals. The designs and materials used in solar cookers seem almost limitless, ranging from simple homemade designs (such as a cardboard box covered with aluminum foil) to sophisticated parabolic mirrors. The expense of solar ovens reflects the materials and design. Parabolic cookers are efficient and able to heat food to temperatures as high as 400 degrees F. Box cookers, such as the Sport Solar Oven, can heat food up to 300 degrees F, plenty for most cooking needs.
RELATED TREND
Solar cookers also help purify water by heating and distilling it, another important need in many parts of the world.
With a broad range of possibilities, there is still room for innovative new designs that can attract the attention of consumers in different parts of the world.
Social entrepreneurs such as Solar Household Energy, Inc. (Chevy Chase, Maryland), Solar Cookers International (Sacramento, California), and the Solar Oven Society (Minneapolis, Minnesota) are working to bring solar cookers to the developing world. Acceptance of the ovens varies, and introducing solar cookers across the globe requires an understanding of the local culture and economy. Many early efforts to bring solar cookers or efficient cookstoves to the developing world resulted in sticker shock as people were unaccustomed to costs higher than a few dollars. The needs for lower costs and an understanding of local markets are good reasons for local eco-entrepreneurs to be involved in the production and selling of these ovens. For example, if buying an oven is not cost effective, eco-entrepreneurs help locals by selling materials and providing instructions to their fellow citizens; setup local co-ops to produce the solar ovens and sell the needed materials they will need; and work with microfinance organizations to support this eco-friendly micro-entrepreneurial drive (see Opportunity 26).
INFORMATION RESOURCE
To learn more about efforts to increase the use of solar cookers in the developing world, visit solarcookers.org.
In the developed world, consumers are starting to take a fresh look at backyard barbeques. A backyard barbeque produces smog, particularly from the lighter fluid and charcoal used; solar cookers are a clean, green alternative for summer barbeques. Solar cookers can cook burgers as well as any grill, without all the flames, smoke, and carbon dioxide, not to mention the flamebroiled carcinogens. A variety of models are on the market, like the Sun Cook from Sun Baked of Toronto, Canada. Founded by Stephen Kerr, Sun Baked sells solar ovens and other solar products. Mirrors on the Sun Cook focus heat on to a black surface, where insulation and a glass-covered chamber hold it in so that cooking food takes only one or two hours. Solar cookers have not made propane or charcoal obsolete yet, but as growing environmental concerns cause some to reevaluate their backyard barbeque, eco-entrepreneurs may be able to market solar BBQs at local home-products stores.
The opportunities in solar cooking include:
The main problem with solar ovens isn’t whether they work. It is relatively straightforward to design, build, and sell solar cookers online, at fairs, or wholesale to green retailers. The problem is acceptance. The prevalence of solar cookers in the developed world has been low so far, but with increasing numbers of green consumers such as LOHAS (lifestyles of health and sustainability) and so many others diving into green gadgetry, the market finally may be ripe for solar ovens. They are not just for greenies eating tofu burgers and veggies, but are also great for manly green carnivores grilling meat. Entrepreneurs of solar ovens need creative marketing to help change preconceptions and show customers that solar cookers work well, making great food. Customers need to see a solar cooker not as a curiosity but a product they want at home. Perhaps a Rachael Ray solargrill revolution is needed. If you can get Rachael or Oprah cooking with your solar grill on TV, you’ve got it made. The greener things get, the cooler the solar barbeque will be. Hip and trendy solar grills may be coming soon to a backyard near you.
ECO-TIP
Home-built solar cookers are fun, but the cardboard and aluminum foil models won’t get hot enough to cook meat, and an undercooked meal is no fun at all.
OPPORTUNITY 7 Microbe Electricity
| The Market Need | New sources of energy and ways to treat wastewater |
| The Mission | Generate electricity from wastewater |
| Knowledge to Start | Microbiology, engineering |
| Capital Required | $$$ to $$$$ |
| Timing to Start | Years |
| Special Challenges | Research to optimize design and find applications |
Here’s a little secret about the energy shortage—there isn’t one. Energy is everywhere, but most of it is in forms we cannot readily use. The trick is figuring out practical ways to convert the energy that already exists all around us into forms we can use. In our cars, we burn gas molecules to convert chemical energy into heat, and the engine converts the heat again to move the car forward. Microscopic organisims like bacteria harness energy that we currently throw away in energy-rich sewage, garbage, or other biomass and convert it into electricity and other forms of energy, unlocking new possibilities in power production.
Life itself depends on capturing