A hot plate solar cooker with electricity generation-Combining a parabolic trough mirror with a sidney tube and heat pipe

Solar cookers supply clean and sustainable energy for cooking and so limit the use of wood or charcoal. A new type of solar cooker is developed with a hot plate. The hot plate offers comfortable access to the food under preparation. The hot plate opens up the opportunity to generate small amounts of electricity with the help of a thermo electric generator (TEG). The cooker uses a parabolic trough mirror, a Sidney Tube and a heat pipe to transport energy to the hot plate. The energy losses in the conversion steps and so the effectiveness of the whole system are verified with experiments. A comparison of the Tube Solar Cooker with a conventional parabolic solar cookers shows that the new solar cooker outperforms the state of the art on several aspects. The hot plate provides easy access to the pot without the risk of exposure to intense radiation. The high temperature of the hot plate increases the number of cooking techniques compared to conventional solar cookers. The avoidance of heat loss at elevated temperatures of the system is an important issue for further improvement. © 2012 IEEE