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Last edited: 19 June 2023
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Pete Schwarz speaking at the SCInet Solar Cooking Convention 2014
Pete Schwartz, Professor in the Physics Department at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, California, USA.
In 2015, Pete Schwartz' students invented ISEC (Insulated Solar Electric Cooking), building the first prototype in three days before driving it to the Solar Cookers International conference in Sacramento, California to roast a chicken stew. Since then, they have continued to collaboratively develop and disseminate the technology, adding a USB charging port and Heat storage capacity with erythritol phase change material (PCM). Collaborations are often built through our appropriate technology classes and include a company that they started in Ghana in August 2019, funded by MECS. Read more at the ISEC research page.
Pete's involvement with solar cooking began in 2007, with particular interest in Scheffler Reflectors and other polar tracking heliostats, but changed to solar electric cooking after extrapolating the decrease in solar panel costs.
News[]
- November 2022: Update on activities - Sabbatical Trip Log: Sept 2022 – Sept 2023 - Pete Schwartz left New York City on August 31, 2022 to spend a year visiting collaborators working on Insulated Solar Electric Cooking Technologies. Follow this blog as Pete travels through Uganda, Malawi, Tanzania, Ghana, and then off to Nepal, and Fiji.
- September 2014: Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, USA, Solar Cooker Research
Publications[]
- July 2022: MECS Final Report Revisions - Dr. Pete Schwartz (Pete provides a summary of his work funded by UK Aid over the last 2.5 years)
- April 2021: Phase change thermal storage: Cooking with more power and versatility - Pete Schwartz, et al
- Insulated Solar Electric Cooking – Tomorrow's healthy affordable stoves? - T. Watkins, P. Arroyo, R. Perry, R. Wang, O. Arriaga, M. Fleming, C. O’Day, I. Stone, J. Sekerak, D. Mast, N. Hayes, P. Keller, P. Schwartz - Development Engineering 2 (2017) 47–52. See the associated video.
- Hot Diodes!: Dirt Cheap Cooking and Electricity for the Global Poor? - Grace Gius, Matthew Walker, Andre Li, Nicholas Adams, R. Van Buskirk, P. Schwartz - Development Engineering, 4 (2019) 100044
- Redirecting Sunlight with Polar Tracking in Developing Countries and Elsewhere (in an online library a design for a polar tracking concentrator)
Audio and video[]
- June 2023: An aluminum plug welded to the bottom of an aluminum pot quickly boils water using only retained heat
- February 2023:
- November 2022: A demonstration workshop in high power ISEC cooking in Togo
HighPower ISECooking-2
We boiled a liter of water in 2 seconds. prototyping our new Insulated Solar Electric Cooker at the workshop in Togo. corresponding to 100 kW, like 100 times the power of a microwave oven. Then we recharged it for an hour and dumped in 1 kg of veggies and finished a stir fry in about 2 minutes
- June 2021:
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Insulated Solar Electric Cooking with Thermal Storage, EWB Sweden, Pete Schwartz, Cal Poly Physics-2
Pete Schwartz presents his team's latest findings, as they develop different approaches to insulated solar electric cooking. He predicts an eventual decline in the use of phase change materials (PCMs) to retain the heat for cooking, as batteries become a more efficient and less expensive way to store energy. This may happen in the next ten years. In the meantime, a solid block of aluminum is showing promise as a simpler way to store heat compared with PCMs.
- February 2021:
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Alternative ISEC Manual Walkthrough
Presentation by Alexis Ziegler of the Living Energy Farm (http://livingenergyfarm.org/) about their alternative construction manual for Insulated Solar Electric Cookers
- January 2021:
- August 2019:
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Solar Electric Cooking in Ghana With Phase Change Thermal Storage, Pete Schwartz, Cal Poly Physics
August, 2019, we spent 3 weeks in Ghana. We made Solar Electric Cookers with Phase Change Thermal Storage with our newly made friends and colleagues. We introduced this cooking method in a small village without electricity
- October 2018:
- February 2017:
- September 2015:
- August 2015:
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Why is SCI Important to You? Pete Schwartz
Pete Schwartz an Associate Professor with the Cal Poly physics department in San Luis Obispo, California, USA, quickly explains why SCI is an important resource for his teaching curriculum.
- July 2014:
External links[]
- January 2021: Insulated Solar Electric Cooker forum
- October 2020: Solar Electric Cooking, Pete Schwartz, Cal Poly Physics (website)
- August 2012: Pete Schwartz discusses fixed reflectors in his paper, Concentrating sunlight with an immobile primary mirror and immobile receiver: Ray-tracing results
- Redirecting Sunlight with Polar Tracking in Developing Countries and Elsewhere
- 2-square-meter Aluminum Scheffler Reflector
- Construction and Improvement of a Scheffler Reflector and Thermal Storage Device, 2010
See also[]
- Photovoltaic cooker designs
- Cal Poly Scheffler Reflector
- Heat storage
- Scheffler Community Kitchen
- Tracking
Contact[]
Pete Schwartz
1441 Iris St.
San Luis Obispo, California 93401
USA
Tel: +1 805-756-1220
Email: pschwart@calpoly.edu
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cpscheffler
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCq_ymV_bBqsqzUYUgPh6rPw