solar cooker 太陽能灶

楊淑媛

Pollution inside homes and other buildings kills more than 4 million people each year. Many people die as a result of breathing smoke or from cooking over woodpowered or coalpowered stoves2.

住宅和其他建筑物的室內污染每年造成超過四百萬人死亡。許多人因吸入濃煙、在燒木頭或是燃煤的爐子上烹飪而死亡。

One way to reduce the number of deaths is through cooking equipment3 powered by the sun. Crosby Menzies， a solar power expert in a South African company， described his latest solar cooker called the “Sol4”. “It is four square meters of mirrors， six to eight meters in length. It is quite a large cooker.”

減少死亡人數的一種方法是使用由太陽提供能量的烹飪設備。克羅斯比·孟席斯，是南非一家公司的太陽能專家。他向我們描述了他最新的名為“Sol4”的太陽能灶。他說：“它由四平方米、六至八米長的鏡子組成。這是一個很大的爐灶。”

The “Sol4” works by reflecting4 light from the sun off large mirrors. The mirrors direct the light at a cooking pan. Then the light heats the pan with solar energy. Within two minutes， the pan is hot enough to cook sausages and onions. In just four minutes， water can be boiled. That is as fast as cooking with natural gas or electricity.

這種太陽能灶（“Sol4”）通過大鏡子反射太陽光來運行。鏡子把反射的太陽光聚集到烹飪鍋，然后，光傳輸太陽能給鍋加熱。不到兩分鐘，平底鍋就能燒熱，可以烹飪香腸和洋蔥。在短短的四分鐘內，水就可以煮開。這與用天然氣或電力烹飪一樣快。

The cooker is also much “friendlier” than other models because people do not have to stand in the sun to use it. And people can prepare meals without having to collect firewood or spend money on coal. Such individuals5 would be less likely to have breathing illnesses harmful smoke.

這種太陽能灶與其它類型相比更加“友好”，因為人們不必站在太陽下就可以使用它。人們不必收集木柴或花錢買煤炭來做飯。這些人也就不太可能因為吸入有害煙霧而患有呼吸類疾病。

At present， the cooker only works when the sun is shining. But engineers are working on a way to make it work without sunlight.

目前，這種太陽能灶只能在陽光照耀的時候才能工作。但是工程師們正在努力研究，希望它能在沒有陽光的時候也能正常工作。

Each cooker costs about $2，000， which is a large amount of money for most Africans. To solve that problem， Crosby Menzies has created a nongovernmental organization6 called Solar Cookers for Africa. It plans to raise money through donations to provide poor people with solar cooking equipment.

每個灶成本約兩千美元，這對大多數非洲人來說是一大筆錢。為了解決這個問題，克羅斯比·孟席斯創建了一個名為“非洲太陽能灶”的非政府組織，計劃通過捐款來籌集資金，為貧困人口提供太陽能烹飪設備。