Mirror solar cooker invention to reduce deforestation

@Alicewangechi

A group of cancer survivors have benefited from solar cookers to protect them from harmful cooking fuel and conserve the environment.

The cookers have a parabolic dish that is fitted with 1,200, 1 and a half inch long mirrors that reflect and converge sun rays to heat up a sufuria.

The cookers were invented by Prof Keziah Ngugi of Green Development NGO.

Ngugi explained that the concept is aimed at easing the pressure on firewood as a fuel to positively impact the local climate.

“As children, we would use mirrors to burn each other in the sun so I wondered how I could use that concept to make a cooker,” she said while handing over the cookers to the survivors on Saturday.

The cookers require simple materials to construct, such as cement, sand, coffee tray mesh and mirrors, molded in a parabolic shape.

Ngugi, an environmentalist, said she is saddened by the fact that rivers that used to have high volumes of water have been reduced to streams due to climate change.

But if such cookers are widely adopted, Ngugi said, they would help many people stop using firewood and charcoal and save trees.

The cookers, she explained, consume about Sh8,000 in construction and only require sunlight to operate.

“They may not be able to work when it rains and they have to be tilted towards the sun as they cook, but that is currently not a problem because we have sun most days. The operator also has to cover their eyes from the reflections of the mirrors”.

Ngugi said she chose cancer survivors as her first beneficiaries as their vulnerable immunity can be affected by other sources of fuel.

The survivors were trained on how to construct and operate the cookers with the professor saying more people will continue to be trained to ensure the cookers are available in every homestead.

Lucy Kamau, a breast cancer survivor, said the majority use charcoal to cook and it produces smoke that can be harmful to ones’ health.

Ahadi Kenya Trust CEO Stanley Kamau, who is partnering with Prof Ngugi to ensure as many people as possible are trained on how to construct the cookers, said they will save beneficiaries time and money used in procuring cooking fuel.

Kamau appealed to the government to adopt the cooker and distribute it to drought stricken areas as it provides relief food.

“Most of the families that are starving do not have anything to cook their food with and suffer even more even after being provided with food. They don’t have money to buy a match box”.

“When I heard of this idea, I thought it was a good idea that can save lives because we have been distributing food in Murang’a but we had to look for ways to also provide people with a source of energy”.

The cookers, he added, should be provided to sick and elderly people in the grassroots to save them from the need to use firewood.

If widely used, Kamau said the cookers will be a game changer as it will ensure the majority of Kenyans use the readily available sun to reduce global warming.

Prime Cabinet Secretary nominee Musalia Mudavadi’s wife Tessie who attended the event, hailed the idea, saying the cookers are affordable and environmentally friendly.

The cookers, she said, will help people in the grassroots, especially mothers to take care of their households with ease.

“A mother will now be able to go about her chores without needing to go look for fuel,” she said.

Tessie, who runs Mudavadi Memorial Foundation Trust Fund, an organisation that helps fight cancer, said the project goes hand in hand with the government’s bottoms-up economic model as it seeks to empower those in the grassroots.

“I'm happy to be part of this project and we will work together to support women,” she said.