Solar cookers with and without thermal storage—A review

The continuous increase in the level of green house gas emissions and the increase in fuel prices are the main driving forces behind efforts to more effectively utilize various sources of renewable energy. In many parts of the world, direct solar radiation is considered to be one of the most prospective sources of energy. Among the different energy end uses, energy for cooking is one of the basic and dominant end uses in developing countries. Energy requirement for cooking accounts for 36% of total primary energy consumption in India. Hence, there is a critical need for the development of alternative, appropriate, affordable mode of cooking for use in developing countries. However, the large scale utilization of this form of energy is possible only if the effective technology for its storage can be developed with acceptable capital and running costs. Thermal energy storage is essential whenever there is a mismatch between the supply and consumption of energy. Latent heat storage in a phase change material is very attractive because of its high storage density with small temperature swing. The choice of PCM plays an important role in addition to heat transfer mechanism in the PCM. In this present work a review has been made to study all the research and development work carried out in the field of solar cooker in particular the storage type solar cookers. A novel concept of PCM-based storage type solar cooker is also presented which is under experimental investigation.