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 The solar cooker in Taleti is based on totally 84 concentrator dishes invented by Wolfgang Scheffler of Switzerland and assembled in a Brahma WRST workshop in Taleti, Abu Road. 

To further boost the output of the new solar steam cooking project in Taleti an improved design for the parabolic concentrators, the receivers and steam generator has been developed with the help of Wolfgang Scheffler, Deepak Ghadia, Brahma Kumaris Solar Department and the company, High Temperature Technology, of Germany, a world leader in heat transfer technology.  

For the solar cooker in Taleti the total reflective surface of the mirrors has been increased by 2 sqm up to 9.5 sqm.  As reflective material, white glass from Germany with a reflection of 94% is used. 

One of the most important parts in concentrator technology is the receiver.  For the Solar Steam Cooking System in Taleti a shell type receiver out of MS, dia 35cm (schedule 40, boiler grade) has been developed.

 The water in the receiver gets heated up by two concentrators (7kw) focusing on both flat sides of the receiver. The hot water immediately shoots up by the thermosyphon principle into the highly insulated header pipe and heats up the water there.  Immediately cool water will flow down into the receiver through an integrated ½” pipe. 

The steam is generated accordingly directly in the header pipe (dia 12” schedule 40, boiler grade) above the receivers.  As the receivers are working on the termosyphon principle there is no need of a separate steam generator heat exchanger or any circulation pump.  This increases the efficiency and there will be no interruption caused by power cuts. 

Through its design and dimension the header pipe works as steam generator, temporary steam storage and feed water reservoir (see attached schematic drawings).  Totally 14 mirrors are focusing on 7 receivers in each module.

6 of this modules are interconnected in a common steam drum.  The system is generating a maximum of 3500 Kg steam per day (6Kwh/sqm) and is’ presently the largest solar steam cooking system in the world.  In combination with highly insulated cooking pots the system already provides enough steam for max. 34000 meals per day. 

The idea of this new design is to minimise electrical loads like pumps etc., to economize the piping and overall design and to boost the efficiency at least by 30% as compared to the system in Mt.Abu.

The aim of the project is to develop and test such a solar based steam generating module (600 kg steam per day) so that this module can easily be replicated at moderate costs all over the country.

As the system has a modular design of 14 mirrors it’s the use can be adapted to either cooking or industrial purposes. 

There is an expected pay back of the system, at present kerosene prices, of 6 yaers.