Presentation to NAEBRS Conference

Photo: Craig Shearer’s Freedom Cooker adapted to fit in the wall of his home in Saskatchewan.

(I’ve posted about this on the Minnesota and Promote solar cooking facebook groups, I don’t think I’ve plugged it into my newsletter until now.)

More by default than reputation, skill, or relevance, my Abstract was accepted for a presentation to the National Ambient Energy for Buildings Research Symposium at the Ghost Ranch, New Mexico last September. No one else had submitted anything on solar cooking, “so you’re in.” Hey, I’ll take a break from being peer-reviewed any day, for the cause.

Each presentation was recorded, and available for download. I’ve download and right back uploaded it to my channel.

There is no location more fitting for a gathering of passive solar proponents than the Ghost Ranch. Perhaps the 100+ earthships outside of Taos would be its equal. But the Ghost ranch was built by and for passive solar architects, builders, and solar tinkerers inclined toward the simpler solar thermal crafts. And it’s gradually become a site for eco-tourism, green seminars, and Georgia O'Keeffe scholars.

Its accommodations are passive solar (mostly) rooms with poor wi-fi. Ones attention has to stretch to fill the span of the landscape and to get to know the ambiently energized solar folks who’ve put a lot of their time into perfecting solar building technologies.

The conference illustrated a great vacuum out there to be filled, that the premiere passive solar conference, a bit high-horsedly re-dubbed Ambient Energy, had no other solar cooks presenting. And except for a handful of serious homeowners who punched holes in their walls to install a solar box cooker, none of the papers and slide shows at the conference gave more than a passing reference to solar cookers. So I was a party crasher.

My subtext theme for the presentation was “Let’s get Passive (Solar) Aggressive.”

I reminded those in the hall that solar thermal advocates in the building trades, can influence the adoption of solar cooking throughout the world. One way to mainstream solar cooking would be to include a built-in solar cooker with every new home, office building, park shelter, and any structure with room enough for a simple box cooker and a reflector or two.

I enjoyed hobnobbing with the professionals and hope to follow through with some of them to update the Festival about their own attempts to add cookers to their building designs.

—Luther