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:For the cooking apparatus see Solar cooker
Solar cooker

A solar oven or solar cooker is a device which uses sunlight as its energy source. Because they use no fuel and they cost nothing to run, humanitarian organizations are promoting their use worldwide to help slow deforestation and desertification, caused by using wood as fuel for cooking....
. For electricity generation see Solar updraft tower
Solar updraft tower

The solar updraft tower is a proposed type of renewable energy power plant. It combines three old and proven technologies: the chimney effect, the greenhouse effect, and the wind turbine....
.

A solar furnace is a structure used to harness the rays of the sun
Sun

The Sun , a G V star, is the star at the center of the Solar System. The Earth and other matter orbit the Sun, which by itself accounts for about 98.6% of the Solar System's mass....
 in order to produce high temperatures, usually for industry. This is achieved using a curved mirror
Mirror

A mirror is an object with one surface polished, which leads to reflection and another opaque. The most familiar type of mirror is the plane mirror, which has a flat surface....
 (or an array of mirrors) that acts as a parabolic reflector
Parabolic reflector

A parabolic reflector is a parabola-shaped Mirror device, used to collect or distribute energy such as light, sound, or radio waves. Parabolic reflectors are used to collect energy from a distant source and bring it to a common Focus , thus correcting spherical aberration found in simpler spherical reflectors....
, concentrating light
Light

Light, or visible light, is electromagnetic radiation of a wavelength that is Visible spectrum to the human eye , or up to 380?750 nm. In the broader field of physics, light is sometimes used to refer to electromagnetic radiation of all wavelengths, whether visible or not....
 (Insolation
Insolation

Insolation is a measure of solar radiation energy received on a given surface area in a given time. It is commonly expressed as average irradiance in watts per square meter or kilowatt-hours per square meter per day ....
) onto a focal point
Focus (optics)

In geometrical optics, a focus, also called an image point, is the point where light rays originating from a point on the object converge ....
.






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:For the cooking apparatus see Solar cooker
Solar cooker

A solar oven or solar cooker is a device which uses sunlight as its energy source. Because they use no fuel and they cost nothing to run, humanitarian organizations are promoting their use worldwide to help slow deforestation and desertification, caused by using wood as fuel for cooking....
. For electricity generation see Solar updraft tower
Solar updraft tower

The solar updraft tower is a proposed type of renewable energy power plant. It combines three old and proven technologies: the chimney effect, the greenhouse effect, and the wind turbine....
.

A solar furnace is a structure used to harness the rays of the sun
Sun

The Sun , a G V star, is the star at the center of the Solar System. The Earth and other matter orbit the Sun, which by itself accounts for about 98.6% of the Solar System's mass....
 in order to produce high temperatures, usually for industry. This is achieved using a curved mirror
Mirror

A mirror is an object with one surface polished, which leads to reflection and another opaque. The most familiar type of mirror is the plane mirror, which has a flat surface....
 (or an array of mirrors) that acts as a parabolic reflector
Parabolic reflector

A parabolic reflector is a parabola-shaped Mirror device, used to collect or distribute energy such as light, sound, or radio waves. Parabolic reflectors are used to collect energy from a distant source and bring it to a common Focus , thus correcting spherical aberration found in simpler spherical reflectors....
, concentrating light
Light

Light, or visible light, is electromagnetic radiation of a wavelength that is Visible spectrum to the human eye , or up to 380?750 nm. In the broader field of physics, light is sometimes used to refer to electromagnetic radiation of all wavelengths, whether visible or not....
 (Insolation
Insolation

Insolation is a measure of solar radiation energy received on a given surface area in a given time. It is commonly expressed as average irradiance in watts per square meter or kilowatt-hours per square meter per day ....
) onto a focal point
Focus (optics)

In geometrical optics, a focus, also called an image point, is the point where light rays originating from a point on the object converge ....
. The temperature at the focal point may reach , and this heat can be used to generate electricity
Electricity

Electricity is a general term that encompasses a variety of phenomena resulting from the presence and flow of electric charge. These include many easily recognizable phenomena such as lightning and static electricity, but in addition, less familiar concepts such as the electromagnetic field and electromagnetic induction....
, melt steel
Steel

Steel is an alloy consisting mostly of iron, with a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.14% by weight , depending on grade. Carbon is the most cost-effective alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten....
, or make hydrogen fuel
Hydrogen fuel

Hydrogen fuel refers to use of hydrogen for its combustive qualities as a fuel and energy carrier. The hydrogen must first be broken out from its compound form with oxygen as water using electolysis or gathered by other means as it does not naturally occur by itself....
.

The term "solar furnace" has also evolved to refer to solar concentrator heating systems using parabolic mirrors or heliostat
Heliostat

A Heliostat is a device that tracks the movement of the sun. It is typically used to orient a mirror, throughout the day, to redirect sunlight along a fixed axis towards a stationary target or receiver....
s where is now commonly achieved. The largest solar furnace in the world is at Odeillo in the Pyrenees
Pyrenees

The Pyrenees are a mountain range in southwest Europe that form a natural border between France and Spain. They separate the Iberian Peninsula from the rest of continental Europe, and extend for about from the Bay of Biscay to the Mediterranean Sea ....
 of France
France

France , officially the French Republic , is a country whose Metropolitan France is located in Western Europe and that also comprises various Overseas departments and territories of France....
, opened in 1970. It employs an array of plane mirrors to gather the rays of light from the sun, reflecting them on to a larger curved mirror. The rays are then focused onto an area the size of a cooking pot and can reach .

History


The ancient Greek
Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek is the historical stage in the development of the Greek language spanning across the Archaic Greece , Classical Greece , and Hellenistic civilization periods of ancient Greece and the classical antiquity....
 / Latin
Latin

Latin is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Military history of the Roman Empire, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe....
 term heliocaminus literally means "solar furnace" and refers to a glass
Glass

Glass generally refers to a Hardness, brittle, transparency amorphous solid, such as that used for windows, many Glass Bottles, or eyewear, including, but not limited to, soda-lime glass, borosilicate glass, acrylic glass, sugar glass, Muscovite , or aluminium oxynitride....
-enclosed sunroom intentionally designed to become hotter than the outside air temperature.

During the Second Punic War
Second Punic War

The Second Punic War lasted from 218 BC to 201 BC and involved combatants in the western and eastern Mediterranean. It was the second of three major wars between Carthage and the Roman Republic....
 (218 - 202 BCE), the Greek
Ancient Greece

The term Ancient Greece refers to the period of History of Greece lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman Republic conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth ....
 scientist
Scientist

A scientist, in the broadest sense, refers to any person that engages in a system activity to acquire knowledge or an individual that engages in such practices and traditions that are linked to schools of thought or philosophy....
 Archimedes
Archimedes

Archimedes of Syracuse was a Greek mathematics, physicist, engineer, inventor, and astronomer. Although few details of his life are known, he is regarded as one of the leading scientists in classical antiquity....
 is said to have repelled the attacking Roman
Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC....
 ships by setting them on fire with a "burning glass" that may have been an array of mirrors. An experiment to test this theory was carried out by a group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private university research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Massachusetts, United States....
 in 2005. It concluded that although the theory was sound for stationary objects, the mirrors would not likely have been able to concentrate sufficient solar energy to set a ship on fire under battle conditions.

The first modern solar furnace is believed to have been built in France in 1949 by Professor Félix Trombe. It is still in place at Mont Louis, near Odeillo. The Pyrenees were chosen as the site for these furnaces due to sunny weather for up to 300 days a year.

Modern uses

The solar furnace principle is being used to make inexpensive solar cooker
Solar cooker

A solar oven or solar cooker is a device which uses sunlight as its energy source. Because they use no fuel and they cost nothing to run, humanitarian organizations are promoting their use worldwide to help slow deforestation and desertification, caused by using wood as fuel for cooking....
s and solar-powered barbecue
Barbecue

Barbecue or barbeque is a method and apparatus for cooking food, often meat, with the heat and hot gases of a fire, smoking wood, or hot coals of charcoal and may include application of a marinade, spice rub, or Basting barbecue sauce to the meat....
s, and for solar water pasteurization
Pasteurization

Pasteurization is a process which slows microbial growth in foods. The process was named after its creator, France chemist and microbiologist Louis Pasteur....
. A prototype Scheffler reflector is being constructed in India
India

India, officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and outlying territories by total area country by geographical area, the List of countries by population country, and the most populous liberal democracy in the world....
 for use in a solar crematorium. This 50 m˛ reflector will generate temperatures of and displace 200-300 kg of firewood used per cremation.

It has been suggested that solar furnaces could be used in space
Outer space

Outer space comprises the relatively empty regions of the universe outside the atmospheres of celestial bodies. Outer space is used to distinguish it from airspace and terrestrial locations....
 to provide energy for manufacturing purposes.

Their reliance on sunny weather is a limiting factor as a source of renewable energy
Renewable energy

Renewable energy is energy generated from natural resources—such as sunlight, wind, rain, tidal energy and geothermal energy—which are Renewable resource ....
 on Earth
Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun. Earth is the largest of the terrestrial planets in the Solar System in diameter, mass and density. It is also referred to as the World and Wiktionary:Terra.Note that by International Astronomical Union convention, the term "Terra" is used for naming extensive land masses, rather...
 but could be tied to thermal energy storage systems for energy production through these periods and into the night.

See also


External links