FEASIBILITY STUDY OF SOLAR FURNACE AS A CREMATORIUM

Abstract

While cremation is an established Hindu ritual practice since ancient times and the Hindu religion permits the cremation of dead body in day-time only, there is much more scope of solar crematorium in this ritual; as solar power is also available in day-time only. Between 500 and 600 kg of wood are used to cremate a dead body. Many trees are felled to meet this requirement. As a result we are significantly contributing in global warming and polluting the atmospheric air much more. Therefore today, the world is moving towards the sustainable energy sources which are renewable and biodegradable in nature. One of most sustainable energy source is sunlight that too is inexhaustible and available free of cost. The heat (energy) produced is very clean with no pollutants. So above environmental problems can be the addressed very well by using solar crematorium. Therefore anyone can be a firm believer of world powered by solar energy. Since the sunlight has very little part, only 20% of its energy as lighting effect and large portion, 80% as thermal effect, So energy of solar radiation can be utilized more in solar thermal power generation than in solar photo-voltaic (which utilizes only lighting effect of sunlight) for power generation. In this report, the most recent developments are described to build a Solar Crematorium in India. A special scheffler reflector has been designed for this purpose. Its speciality is a flexible surface curvature and simultaneously a non-moving focal area.