We can increase the visibility of solar cooking by giving it its own holiday! Due to the way sunlight and climate work, to have an international holiday for the whole world, we will need to make it a holiday at least three parts, one for the northern tier, one for the southern tier, and one (at least) for the equatorial region (maybe someone more learned in equatorial climates will know if they would need more than one date).

The northern tier will be kicking off this idea with a First Annual International Smoke-Free Solar Cookout! This will be held at midsummer, on the first Saturday in August, which sets this year's date at August 2, 2008. We hope other climate regions will consider what a good date would be for their areas.

The main idea is to have a day in the middle of the best cooking season for a given latitude tier or region that is dedicated to celebrating this wonderful technology for cooking with sunshine. Solar cooks can take their cookers to parks or town squares or other appropriate public places for a smoke-free solar cookout! Some solar cooking enthusiasts, especially in areas where there are concentrations of suncookers, may want to make even more of an event of it.

Groups that are doing more of an event might want to contact local press to bring even more attention to solar cooking, but the most important thing is to take your cookers out and cook where people can see. If all you do is have a family solar picnic in a park and chat in a friendly way with people who stop and ask about the cookers (as people so often do), you will have done a very good thing for solar cooking and for the planet. Solar cooking is an idea whose time has come, and it's time to show the world! It's fun to cook with sun! Please help spread the word! Tell all your suncooking friends about this idea and let them know they can come here for further information. If you are a northern tier suncooker and are involved in solar workshops or other solar projects in spring or early summer, remember to pass the information to students or others who are involved. This is a chance for the season's new cookers to develop their skills so they can join in the celebration.

Contents 1 Promotion 2 Event Ideas 3 Locations of Observance 4 Dates 4.1 Northern hemisphere 4.1.1 Special Event Locations and Contacts 4.1.2 Alternate dates due to local climatic conditions 4.2 Mexico 4.3 Southern hemisphere 4.3.1 Alternate dates due to local climatic conditions 5 See Also

Promotion

You can download a pdf of a general poster here You can print from this pdf but not edit.

You can download a .doc of the poster that will let you edit and add local information here (if you try and it looks like nothing is happening—this may especially apply to Safari users—check your desktop to see if it is there).

Event Ideas

• Hand out flyers with information and web resources
• Give away samples of delicious solar cooked foods. To prepare for the possiblity of bad weather, you can solar cooking during sunny days in the week preceding the conference. Freeze the cooked food if necessary until the day of the event.
• Sell solar food to raise money for Solar Cookers International or Solar Household Energy or another of the excellent suncooking Category:NGOs.
• Make a display that shows how this simple, effective technology can save lives and trees while helping to mitigate global warming and dimming.
• Incorporate a workshop in which people can build a simple solar panel cooker.
• Sing Solar Songs.
• Present a skit or play about solar cooking while the sun takes care of the food.
• Organize a solar cooking contest.

Locations of Observance

If you observed the holiday in 2008, even if you just made a point of taking your cooker to a park to cook, please add your location to this list.

• 2008 Moscow, Idaho, USA; Corvallis, Oregon, USA; Wichita, Kansas, USA; Golden, Colorado USA;

Dates

Northern hemisphere

The date of this event is defined as the first Saturday in August of each year. The date for 2009 is August 1.

Special Event Locations and Contacts

• Moscow, Idaho Sharon Cousins will organize an event for the Moscow area. For more information or to help, email [1] or phone 208-882-9028.

Alternate dates due to local climatic conditions

Mexico

Southern hemisphere

The date of this event is defined as the first Saturday in February of each year. This year this day falls on February 2, 2008.

Alternate dates due to local climatic conditions

See Also

• Calendar of events

• Organizing Solar Cooking Events