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writing:solar_concentrators [2025/12/01 16:13] – JacobCoffinWriteswriting:solar_concentrators [2025/12/01 16:31] (current) – JacobCoffinWrites
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-  * **[[https://solarcooking.fandom.com/wiki/Category:Solar_cooker_plans|solar cookers]]** - there are a ton of ways to cook with sunlight, there's a vibrant DIY community and hundreds of designs to fit almost any circumstance, requirement, or starting materials.+  * **[[https://solarcooking.fandom.com/wiki/Category:Solar_cooker_plans|Solar Cookers]]** - there are a ton of ways to cook with sunlight, there's a vibrant DIY community and hundreds of designs to fit almost any circumstance, requirement, or starting materials.
       * Two interesting variants to call out: there are some designs that allow for fairly traditional ovens (most of these are more of a replacement for a camping stove than a kitchen oven, but even that can be done: [[https://www.euronews.com/green/2023/04/23/solar-baking-how-the-sun-is-helping-to-reduce-the-cost-of-bread-in-lebanon|This system]] appears to use a series of reflective troughs on the roof to heat a transfer fluid running through a tube and conveys that down to a fairly traditional convection oven. While a [[https://solarcooking.fandom.com/wiki/Scheffler_Community_Kitchen|Scheffler reflector]] is a huge mirrored dish positioned outside a building to [[http://www.solare-bruecke.org/index.php/en/component/content/article/2-the-scheffler-reflector?itemid=|bounce light through a hole in a wall into an oven]].       * Two interesting variants to call out: there are some designs that allow for fairly traditional ovens (most of these are more of a replacement for a camping stove than a kitchen oven, but even that can be done: [[https://www.euronews.com/green/2023/04/23/solar-baking-how-the-sun-is-helping-to-reduce-the-cost-of-bread-in-lebanon|This system]] appears to use a series of reflective troughs on the roof to heat a transfer fluid running through a tube and conveys that down to a fairly traditional convection oven. While a [[https://solarcooking.fandom.com/wiki/Scheffler_Community_Kitchen|Scheffler reflector]] is a huge mirrored dish positioned outside a building to [[http://www.solare-bruecke.org/index.php/en/component/content/article/2-the-scheffler-reflector?itemid=|bounce light through a hole in a wall into an oven]].
       * Downsides: Less convenient - you generally need clear skies and they get less and less effective at higher latitudes. You also need sunlight - this might seem obvious, but think of how many changes you'd have to make if you could only cook when it's light out. No more bakers hours getting food ready before you open, cook your hot meals during the day rather than for breakfast, etc.       * Downsides: Less convenient - you generally need clear skies and they get less and less effective at higher latitudes. You also need sunlight - this might seem obvious, but think of how many changes you'd have to make if you could only cook when it's light out. No more bakers hours getting food ready before you open, cook your hot meals during the day rather than for breakfast, etc.
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 === Other Systems === === Other Systems ===
  
-Fiber Optic Daylighting Rig+So far we've mostly talked about using heat, but what about light? There are also some clever ways to collect and redistribute sunlight as illumination:
  
 +  * **[[https://dornob.com/windowless-daylight-fiber-optics-project-sun-sky-inside/|Fiber Optic Daylighting]]** These systems use solar collector systems outside (usually some sort of multi-lens rig mounted on motors to seek the sun throughout the day, though some are simpler and passive) to redirect sunlight into fiber optic cables, which are used to bring it indoors to simple diffusers that scatter the light at the destination, usually a dark interior room. The advantages over light bulbs are that it's genuinely natural light, and that it lacks the strobing effect you get with most electric lights. It only works during the day, but that's the time when humans are most active. They also make some sense in some kinds of [[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0038092X22007484|agriculture]]. Perhaps they'd be a good fit for growing crops in [[winter_greenhouses|walipinis]] or underground during the winter.
 +  * **[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_tube|Light Tubes]]** If fiberoptic daylighting sounds a little over-complicated for your setting, perhaps a light tube is a better fit. These work in a similar way, but are passive and simpler to maintain. The downsides are that they capture less light and work best when the 'tube' is short and straight.