Lytefire

Last edited: 11 June 2025

Lytefire Solar Oven in Mozambique (2025). Photo credit: Lytefire. — Lytefire Solar Oven in Mozambique (2025). *Photo credit: Lytefire.*

Lytefire is a social and impact enterprise based in Tampere, Finland. It has been created in 2012.

Lytefire fabricates promotes big community solar cookers and solar ovens for productive use of clean energy. The team works mostly with international NGO's and association. Training is offered to TVET programs, and when there is a desire to create a solar bakery. The Lytefire solar oven is hybrid (charcoal) to be used during the rainy season. Lytefire gives access to its device through several entry points corresponding to different technical levels and contexts: – Local and international NGOs purchasing ready made Lytefire units manufactured industrially, – DIYers purchasing our construction manual to build the most basic version, – Special projects commissioning us for high-tech developments.

Lytefire's Mission[]

Lytefire's core mission is to eradicate energy poverty and minimize the damage of climate change. Our model can be discovered here.

Lytefire solar ovens and community cookers have been installed by the team in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Sudan, Ethiopia, Mozambique, South Africa, Burkina-Faso, Guinea-Bissau, Senegal, Mali, Haiti, Philippines, Brazil, Mexico, Finland, France, and Switzerland.

The team based in EU (Finland/Switzerland) is in charge of sales, partnerships, communication and design. The team based in East Africa and EU is ensuring the training and, sometimes, installation. The idea is to keep the team small in order to reduce the costs and to provide lots of at-distance assistance.

The company was originally called Solar Fire, then GoSol was used but everything has been rebranded under Lytefire in 2021. Currently, two of the original founders are still working in the company which is led by a Board elected yearly by the Shareholders. This Board ensures that the decisions are made horizontally and the Board Directors are volunteering. It is also of note to mention that no dividend are paid.

Our Tech[]

Lytefire technologies are high power solar concentrator built with off-the-shelf materials available everywhere in the world. To learn more about the technology visit the Tech section of our site.

The performances are interesting when it comes to small scale community cooking, water purification or solar bakeries (the average amount of baked goods per day is 40 to 50kg). Two case studies in Uganda and in Kenya are available on request. Lytefire has also quantified the impact of the solar oven in terms of ROI and of forest preservation. The 2 calculators are available on the site.

News[]

Photo credit: Lytefire

March 2024: International Women's Day appreciation - A founder of Lytefire, Eva Wissenz, expresses her gratitude for achieving greater gender equality within their organization and with the people they serve. She worked for a decade within a masculine team, and like any other sister, she brought that experience and her personal family patterns as well, to the more or less patriarchal expected directives coming from education and society. For a long time she thought that ours was a "women's project" but it's not true. All successes come from the right cooperation between empowered women and empowered men. Solar cooking has created a release from many mundane tasks usually performed by women, and has provided a way to find opportunities to advance the way of life for themselves and their families. Eva has provided some photos of some of the women who have benefited from the introduction to solar cooking.

Happy trainees with buns fresh from the oven. Lytefire training to solar bakery creation, Uganda, 2022 - *Photo Credit: Lytefire*

April 2021: Creating Solar Entrepreneurs with Solar Energy in Uganda - A great project is happening in Uganda where 11 communities are benefiting from a program designed to the creation of solar bakeries (CBO's). Most humanitarian projects and users can be found on the website.
November 2019: Community bakery - GoSol.org reports that one of their solar array cookers, first put into use in 2017 in the Kisumu area, in Kenya is still in use. It was later transferred to Friends of Ndere, a very active baking community, which already had a GoSol concentrator. In spite of this being one an early pilot unit, they are still using this unit to bake bread. More information...

SOL5_Technology_-_Solar_Energy_for_SMEs — SOL5 Technology - Solar Energy for SMEs

Friends_of_Ndere-0 — Friends of Ndere-0

A video in Swahili showing the concentrator in action

GoSol has introduced a community solar oven in Gulu, Uganda. - *Photo credit: GoSol*

October 2018: Community solar baking oven commissioned in Gulu - A new solar array oven has been installed by GoSol.org. Lorin Symington reports the new oven is capable of baking 30-35 kg of bread per day. The company has trained a group 12 local youths from Smart-up Factory, a program of Plan International, in operating the oven. More information...

Muhammad Hassaan, an engineering student from builds a solar concentrator as part of his final school project. - GoSol — Muhammad Hassaan, an engineering student from Pakistan builds a solar concentrator as part of his final school project. - *GoSol.org*

July 2015: Interesting DIY project - Muhammad Hassaan, an engineering student from Pakistan, builds a GoSol.org solar concentrator as part of his final school project. With help from two other teammates, they have designed a hybrid solar and biomass power generation system. A few DIY constructions can be found on the site and the team aims to open a hub at some point when there will be more.