Nicaragua Technical Summary

During spring break, Amanecer travelled to Sabana Grande, Nicaragua to build solar cookers with Las Mujeres Solares de Totalgalpa and conduct our annual technical exchange. This year, we gave a presentation on our work relating to the concentrating solar cooker and presented an update on the research that had been done by the Fall 2009 CEE 4920 class. During the week, we built two 30"x30" solar box ovens. Over the course of this process, we watched for possible opportunities to improve oven design or construction methods, as well as research questions that future teams may wish to investigate. At the conclusion of the trip, we produced a document entitled "Grupo Fenix Oven Brainstorm" summarizing our ideas. Items on the list were labeled with icons to indicate whether they represented possible changes to construction practices, possible design adjustments, possibilities for future testing, or some combination of the three. A copy of this document can be found in Appendix D.

In addition to the research questions posed in the document, the following are general questions that are of interest to Las Mujeres Solares:

1)     What design changes would help Las Mujeres Solares bring down the costs of the ovens they offer for sale? Note that this primarily means reducing material costs.

2)     How can the ovens be made to look more elegant and professionally constructed, and thus more marketable?

3)     What accounts for the decline in oven performance over the course of its expected life, and how might this be mitigated?