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A groundswell of knowledge and innovation recently emerged in Bogor, Indonesia during a week-long Learning Exchange on agroecology economies convened by the Agroecology Fund. More than 100 participants from 20 countries, representing-Asian grassroots organizations, advisors and donors shared experiences and strategies to strengthen local agroecology-based food systems.

The Learning Exchange made clear that for innovation, agroecology does not rely on technology transfer. At the very center of agroecology lies the principle of knowledge co-creation.

A gallery of 45 stories showcased agroecological approaches to farming and fishing across Asia. They told stories of circular economies, revived traditions and local knowledge, and securing land reform. They described triumphs and hardships of marginal farmers and fishers challenging the domination of industrial food systems and grappling with the mounting threats of climate change.

Behind the posters were grassroots innovators, grantees of the Agroecology Fund. The Agroecology Fund is a pooled, multi-donor grantmaking fund and learning connector which has provided over US$40 million in funding to support agroecology movements to strengthen resilient, healthy food systems; uphold rights; conserve biodiversity; and address climate change through sustainable, low-input agriculture.

Globally, agroecological systems are vital not only for addressing poverty and hunger but also for climate change mitigation. Agriculture alone contributes 30 percent of greenhouse gas emissions through production and use of industrial farm inputs—fertilizers and pesticides.

In a discussion on climate and agroecology entrepreneurship, Sakiul Millat Morshed of SHISUK from Bangladesh and Karan Singh of Farmversities from India presented their agricultural development models rooted in traditional knowledge. The SHISUK agroecological experience integrates rice and fish farming on Bangladesh’s floodplains, significantly boosting farmers’ year-round income by cutting paddy cultivation expenses and adding revenue from aquaculture. Before SHISUK stepped in, the seasonal inundation of the floodplains pushed farmers out of their livelihoods and deeper into poverty.

In Sakiul Millat’s view, “traditional knowledge is social capital that helps a community to grow together.” SHISUK’s success comes from blending social capital with modern science, managing natural resources wisely and adapting to climate change. In addition to better income and nutritional benefits to the farmers, strengthening entrepreneurship on floodplains improves soil moisture, groundwater recharge, while diminishing pollution.

Karan Singh of Farmversitiy, a grassroots organization based in Rajasthan, India, shared how his work with young farmers, men and women, has dissuaded migration to cities, revived traditional farming practices, and introduced value-added farm-products as additional source of income.

Nantawan Manprasong of The Field Alliance shared their approach, from Vietnam and Thailand, to collaborating with government and community-supported school meal programs, where children not only eat traditional agroecological food, but also grow it at their school. Strengthening this public procurement demand mechanism fortifies an agroecology economy and makes visible and viable traditional food varieties. Manprasong described nutritional improvements from agroecology, and the health and environmental benefits of pesticide-free farming practices and climate change resilience.

Consumer awareness is likewise key to the growth of agroecology economies. Participatory Guarantee Systems (PGS) were discussed as a popular, low‑cost mechanism for building trust between producers and consumers. Community-led certification validates the application of agroecological principles. Muhil Kannaiyan of the Thalavady Farmers Foundation, India, said “we leverage agroecology’s sustainability, ecological, health and ethical values to build consumer trust.” The Foundation’s multilingual smartphone app ‘Farmfit’ gives farmers direct access to markets—enabling them to reach consumers directly and bypass intermediaries. The application helps with pricing and distribution challenges and results in better returns on food production.

But agroecology economies receive little investment on an uneven playing field already biased towards heavily subsidized industrial agroecology. Cristino Panerio of the Philippines, an advisor to the Agroecology Fund, spoke to the ways in which agroecological farmers are often left out of a longer value chain, which favor use of chemical inputs over bioinputs.

Critical to a strong local agroecology economy is strengthening territorial markets, often in collaboration with municipal governments, a strategy employed from Turkey to Malaysia. These markets function best with sufficient local supply of agroecological produce, which is much aided by robust networks of food-producing cooperatives.

Serikat Petani Indonesia (SPI), a national farmers organization and the learning exchange co-host in Indonesia, described how farmers’ market and cooperativism empowers otherwise marginal farmers. After years of struggle for peasants’ rights to land and seeds, establishing food sovereignty zones has helped achieve productivity, at par with industrial farming—but at significantly lower costs. And FAO studies confirm that agroecological practices can deliver higher long-term yields without external inputs, and enhance crop resilience in the face of an uncertain climate.

SPI’s work underscores how localized control and collective enterprise can lay the groundwork for an agroecology food economy. Recalling her experience with the empty supermarket shelves during Covid and setting up markets for agroecology products across Bangkok, Anne Lapapan of The Assembly of the Poor, Thailand, stated that the pandemic showed how neither consumers nor farmers can rely on long supply chains dominated by transnational corporations for their food and seeds. During the pandemic, the Assembly of the Poor ensured agroecological vegetable supply in Bangkok’s urban neighborhoods.

Participants from India shared experiences leveraging government programs to finance agroecology. Sridhar Radhakrishnan, sustainable agriculture specialist and AEF advisor from India, suggested that to scale agroecology, organizations need to explore local financing beyond traditional donor models. He cited examples from India.

The discussions underscored the global forces that conflict with the growth of localized agroecological economies. Azra Sayeed of Roots for Equity, Pakistan, spoke to the layered vulnerabilities faced by smallholder farmers—ranging from war and climate crises to debt, economic restructuring, and displacement in the name of development. AEF advisor Lim Ching cautioned against biodiversity offsets, noting that related schemes such as carbon credits had not yet delivered on their sustainability and equity claims. She cautioned that such offsets can have perilous outcomes for communities with irreversible ecological damage.

A report by the Global Alliance for the Future of Food estimates that a global transition to agroecology would require a US$250-430 billion investment per year to align our food systems with the 1.5°C Paris Agreement. We have a long way to go. The Asia Learning Exchange clearly brought to light dozens of impactful community-based initiatives hungry for investment and capable of leading an agroecological shift in the world’s food systems.

Articles like the one you just read are made possible through the generosity of Food Tank members. Can we please count on you to be part of our growing movement? Become a member today by clicking here.

Photo courtesy of Agroecology Fund

The post Op-Ed | Asia’s Farmers Root for a Resilient Future appeared first on Food Tank.

Open Letter – Please Say No to Dirty Drax’s Plea to Pollute

Headline News:

• “‘Tipping Point’ Threshold Reached For World’s Coral Reefs” • The latest Global Tipping Points Report suggests the world’s coral reefs are at risk of mass dieback. Over 80% of the world’s coral reefs were bleached by heat in the past two years. Countries worldwide will meet at COP30 in November to discuss reducing greenhouse gas emissions. [ABC]

Coral (Francesco Ungaro, Unsplash, cropped)

• “The West’s Power Grid Could Be Stitched Together, If Red And Blue States Buy In” • A regional energy market in the West would meet the demands of eleven states, bolstering utilities’ power plants with surplus energy from across the region. With the passage of a landmark new law in California, that market is finally on its way to becoming a reality. [Stateline]
• “India’s Renewable Energy Capacity Surges In H1 FY25 With 25-GW Addition” • India’s renewable energy sector continues to gain momentum, achieving a capacity addition of approximately 25 GW in the first half of FY25, the current fiscal year. This move was primarily driven by the solar power segment, which added around 21.7 GW. [Power Technology]
• “NextEnergy Capital Powers Up 60-MW Hatherden Project” • NextEnergy Capital has energised its latest UK solar farm, the 60-MW Hatherden project, on behalf of its own NextEnergy UK I fund. The milestone takes the fund’s total operational capacity to 380 MW, more than doubling the size of its portfolio over the past twelve months. [reNews]
• “California Oil Workers Face An Uncertain Future In Its Energy Transition” • Thousands of workers could lose jobs in coming years as California tries to reduce its reliance on fossil fuels. But maybe not. Energy company Valero said earlier this year it would close a refinery in the Bay Area, and now Democrats are considering how to keep it open. [ABC News]

For more news, please visit geoharvey – Daily News about Energy and Climate Change.

“Colonialism: A Love Story” by writer and academic Billy-Ray Belcourt of the Driftpile Cree Nation. Like much of Belcourt’s work, “Colonialism: A Love Story” mixes theory with poetics to explore the enduring violences of colonialism on the queer NDN body.

Poems for Indigenous Peoples’ Day at poets.org.

Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, natural scientist and member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation. The author argues that understanding other beings leads to an understanding of the generosity of the earth, and that we must learn to give our own gifts in turn.

“Writing Myself Into Existence: An Essay on the Erasure of Black Indigenous Identity in Canadian Education” by Etanda Arden, who identifies as Black and Indigenous and describes the imperative of making spaces for pride and recognition and for a Black Indigenous curriculum, which applies to both the Canadian and U.S. systems.

New York Public Library Recommended Reading List Honoring Indigenous Peoples.

All Our Relations by Winona LaDuke: an account of Native struggles against environmental and cultural degradation featuring chapters on the Seminoles, the Anishinaabeg, the Innu, the Northern Cheyenne, and the Mohawks, among others.

“A Peril that Dwelt Among the Navajos”: an L.A. Times exposé by Judy Pasternak, author of Yellow Dirt: A Poisoned Land and Betrayal of the Navajos. Pasternak documents the effects of uranium mining on Indigenous land. 

An Indigenous Elsewhere: A Conversation with Sandy Grande and Bhatki Shringarpure published in the Los Angeles Review of Books. In this interview, Quechua National, scholar, and author of Red Pedagogy, Sandy Grande, reflects on education, feminism, capitalism, and identity.

Wandering Stars, Tommy Orange’s (Cheyenne and Arapaho) second novel, traces an Indigenous family’s lineage from the Sand Creek Massacre (1864) to present-day Oakland. 

Theory of Water: Nishnaabe Maps to the Times Ahead by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson (Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg) offers a radical critique of the present and a reimagining of the relationship between the human and water.

A New Order of Things: Property, Power, and the Transformation of the Creek Indians, 1733–1816 by Claudio Saunt, looks at the encounters of Muscogee (Creeks) with Europeans and capitalism. Saunt explains how a division between Creek “haves” and “have-nots” developed and helped stoke the 1813-1814 “Redstick War,” which combined a revolt of the have-nots against private wealth with a fight against U.S. encroachment.

Indigenous Presses listed at IndigenousJournalists.org.

Native-led news site Buffalo’s Fire.

Arizona Luminaria, A first-of-its-kind database dedicated to Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, Two-Spirit, and Transgender People in Arizona.

The documentaries Bad Press (about censorship of Native stories and resistance to censorship) and More Than a Word (about eliminating racist sports mascots).

Raye Zaragoza, a singer-songwriter of mixed heritage, including O’odham. She wrote the song “In the River” in 2016 to show support for the Standing Rock Sioux tribe’s protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline.

 

The post Indigenous Peoples’ Day appeared first on Tempest.

The Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA) ushered in a new chapter of leadership during its Annual General Meeting held on October 5, 2025, at Sapphier Addis Hotel in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The meeting, which brought together representatives from across the continent, marked a moment of renewal and continuity for Africa’s largest civil society […]

The post Reverend Tolbert Thomas Jallah, Jr. Elected New Chairperson of AFSA Board of Directors first appeared on AFSA.

OBM is fundamentally changing how power suppliers approach risk management for large-load customers.

Enhancing load flexibility is essential to improve grid reliability, integrate renewable energy sources, and achieve economic efficiency. Learn how to unlock the right strategies.

Illinois is moving full speed into a clean energy future—and HACIA is making sure small and diverse businesses aren’t left behind.

Image: The insulated solar electric cooker that we build in this manual. Photo by Marie Verdeil. ARTICLE

• Cooking’s high power use
• How to adapt an electric cooking device to solar power
• The advantages of solar electric cooking
• Our choice of building materials: Tiles, cork, mortar
• Self-made electric resistance heating element
• How to use the solar electric cooker
• Alternative cooker designs

STEP BY STEP BUILDING PROCESS

• What you need: materials and tools
• Step 1: build the structure
• Step 2: make the electric heat resistance.
• Step 3: add insulation, create the heat storage and embed the electric heat resistance.
• Step 4: secure the cooking chamber and add the remaining insulation.
• Step 5: finishing touches.
• Credits

Cooking’s high power use

Electric cooking devices are challenging to operate on an off-grid solar PV system. For example, an electric oven requires between 1,000 and 5,000 watts of power, while electric stove burners have an average power consumption of 1,000 to 3,000 watts per burner. If you want to use an oven and one electric stove burner simultaneously, you need a solar array of at least 32 square meters in optimal weather conditions - just to cook. 1

You can overcome this problem by storing solar power in lead-acid or lithium-ion batteries. If these batteries are powerful enough, they can temporarily provide you with a higher power supply than your solar array can deliver. Batteries are also necessary if you want to cook after sunset or in bad weather, which is likely the case. Unfortunately, batteries account for 70-90% of the costs and the energy invested in a solar PV system. 2

Cooking thus makes it difficult to completely disconnect a household from the power grid and switch to autonomous, smoke-free, small-scale power production. 3 That is especially so when you have a small budget and limited space for solar PV panels. For example, when I attempted to go off the grid in my apartment in Barcelona by using solar panels on the balcony and window sills, it was mainly the electric cookstove that thwarted my efforts. 4

Image: The insulated solar electric cooker that we build in this manual. Photo by Marie Verdeil. How to adapt an electric cooking device to solar power?

Many of the devices we take for granted nowadays were designed for an era of abundant electricity generated by fossil fuels. However, the electric oven we build in this manual demonstrates that modern appliances can be redesigned for an era of intermittent, less concentrated power sources, such as wind and solar energy. Our oven is powered by a 100-watt solar panel, small enough (50x90cm) to fit on a balcony. Furthermore, it can cook after sunset, without the use of batteries.

The key to significantly reducing the power consumption of a cooking device is thermal insulation. Our electric solar oven has 5 cm of insulation on all six sides. Its power use is further reduced by a lower cooking temperature of about 120°C (248°F). You can cook all food safely at much lower temperatures than those typical in modern cooking devices - it just takes longer.

Our oven is powered by a 100-watt solar panel, small enough (50x90cm) to fit on a balcony.

The key to cooking after sunset without batteries is thermal mass. Rather than storing electricity from solar panels in a battery for operating the cooker at night, the heat supplied by the solar panel during the day is stored in the appliance itself. Because the oven retains a high temperature at sunrise, it’s quickly ready for cooking again in the morning. Connected to a solar panel, it’s almost always preheated and ready to use.

Thermal mass also allows the cooker to continue operating after periods of clouds and rain. Likewise, opening the oven door hardly affects the temperature inside. The heat is stored in the mortar and tiles, and the air temperature quickly returns to normal when the door is closed again.

Our oven is heated by a self-made electric resistance that connects directly to the solar panel, without any intervening battery, solar charge controller, or voltage regulator. To maximize energy efficiency, the oven chamber is dimensioned around a metal oven tray and features a side door. Its shape and weight resemble those of a regular oven.

Image: A drawing of the solar electric tiled cooker. Illustration by Marie Verdeil. The advantages of solar electric cooking

The device we build in this manual is known as an “insulated solar electric cooker” or “ISEC”. The ISEC is a more recent and more sophisticated version of the “solar box cooker”, which is an insulated wooden box with one or more transparant glass plates on top. When a solar box cooker is put in the sun, its interior reaches temperatures that are high enough to boil water and cook food. 5

While an insulated solar electric cooker also consists of a well-insulated box, it does not have a glass plate on top. It’s powered by a solar PV panel instead, which is connected to an electric heating element inside the cooker. One could also describe the ISEC as a fireless cooker with an electric heater inside. 6

Image: Two conventional, non-electric solar box cookers. Solar energy enters the glass plate and heats up the interior. Built by Audrey Belliot (Slowlab) and Marie Verdeil. Photo by Marie Verdeil. Image: An insulated solar electric cooker is powered by a solar PV panel, which is connected to an electric heating element inside the cooker. Photo by Marie Verdeil.

The conventional solar box cooker is a very simple device that works without electricity and is cheap and easy to build. 7 By comparison, the ISEC is a bit more complex to build and requires a high-tech solar panel. However, solar electric cooking has several important advantages that can make the extra effort worthwhile:

1. An electric solar oven can be located inside your kitchen. Conventional solar box cookers only work when they are outside in the sun. That is great for events and picnics, or if you have a garden. However, for many people, it would be more practical to have their cooking appliance in their kitchen. The ISEC makes this possible because only the solar panel needs to be outside. In winter, having the cooker inside will also increase its energy efficiency. It will lose less heat to the environment due to cold and wind.

2. An electric solar oven can be insulated on all sides. Solar box cookers cannot be insulated on the top side; otherwise, solar radiation cannot enter the appliance. 8 In contrast, an ISEC can be insulated on all sides, making it more energy efficient than a non-electric solar box cooker. You can further increase the oven’s insulation by draping one or more wool blankets or carpets over it, which is not possible with a non-electric solar box cooker.

3. An electric solar oven works well in cloudy weather. Conventional solar cookers require full sun to function effectively. That is especially true for parabolic cookers, which concentrate solar rays at a focal point; however, solar box cookers also exhibit low performance during cloudy weather. In contrast, the electric solar cooker can get around that problem by using more or larger solar PV panels. During sunny days, you can use the excess solar PV capacity for other purposes. 2

4. An electric solar oven needs no attention. Solar box cookers need to be turned towards the sun at least every 15-30 minutes. Parabolic solar cookers require even more frequent movement. In contrast, an ISEC requires no attention. Of course, you could turn the solar panels towards the sun every 15 minutes, which will speed up the heating of the ISEC’s interior. However, solar panels are less sensitive to solar orientation than solar box cookers. Once you have placed food in the insulated solar electric cooker, you can leave it alone.

5. An electric solar oven allows you to cook after sunset. By embedding the electric heating element in a material with a high thermal mass, an ISEC can remain at high temperature for many hours after sunset. While several methods exist to add heat storage to a conventional solar cooker, they are complex and don’t work very well. For example, adding thermal mass to a conventional solar box cooker would make it too heavy to move around and follow the sun. An ISEC with thermal energy storage is also heavy, but it can remain stationary.

Our choice of building materials

Low-tech Magazine did not invent the ISEC. Our experiments with insulated solar electric cookers, which began in the summer of 2024, are inspired by the work done at Cal Poly University and Living Energy Farm 910, which we described in an earlier article on direct solar power. 2 We borrowed ideas and knowledge from the manuals made by these pioneers, but we also saw some room for improvements, mostly in the choice of building materials. We also applied the concept of insulated solar cooking to a DIY coffeemaker, for which we will publish a separate manual soon.

Rather than glass wool, sheet metal, and plastic buckets, we have chosen to build our cooking device with tiles, cork, plaster, wood, and mortar.

Rather than glass wool, sheet metal, and plastic buckets, we have chosen to build our cooking device with tiles, cork, plaster, wood, and mortar. These materials are easier to obtain and to work with, and they are more aesthetically pleasing. We aimed to design an appliance that people would actually want to see in their kitchen, and which can be built and repaired with only a few standard tools. It remains to be seen how durable our material choices will be in the long term. Still, for now, the device has been operated extensively for several months without any significant signs of damage.

Image: Some of the materials we have used. Photo by Marie Verdeil.

Our solar electric cooker consists of several key components: the structure (a wooden box), the electric heating element (nichrome wire), the insulation (cork), the thermal mass (mortar and tiles), and a solar PV panel.

Ceramic & terracotta tiles

The use of tiles is the distinctive feature of our design. Most ISECs built to date use aluminum for the inside oven compartment and metal or plastic (for example, a bucket) for the outside. However, making a water-tight aluminium box is not easy and requires specialist tools. Plastic works well as an outer shell, but it looks rather bad and may become brittle over time.

The use of tiles is the distinctive feature of our design.

In our oven, thick terracotta tiles form the cooking chamber, providing a waterproof, fireproof, and easy-to-clean interior surface. The tiles prevent water from entering the insulation layer or the electrical system, and they ensure that the insulation does not become damaged by heat. 11 We also put tiles on the outside of the cooker, where they please the eye, protect the device against water damage from the outside, and make it easy to clean.

Image: The oven chamber, made from thick terracotta roof tiles. Photo by Marie Verdeil.

Tiles are easy and cheap to obtain: we collected all of them on the streets of Barcelona. Tiling can be accomplished with minimal skills and tools. You need a tile cutter if you want to cut tiles shorter, but you can avoid this by choosing the right size of tiles or by applying a “trencadís” technique, made famous by architect Antoni Gaudí. This technique involves dropping tiles so that they break and rearranging them altogether as a mosaic.

Using a tile cutter requires some practice, and you will likely break a few tiles as you learn. Make a groove in the tile by passing the sharp tungsten wheel several times across it. Then apply some pressure on both sides with your hands: the tile should break along the line. Some tiles are more challenging to cut than others. To fix tiles to wood, use a cement-based adhesive mortar. To attach tiles to cork, we applied a layer of plaster bands in some cases, as mortar doesn’t adhere well to cork. Use grout to seal the joints between tiles.

Cork or wool for insulation

Insulation is key to the workings of all solar cookers, including the ISEC. It’s the insulation that allows cooking with a very small solar panel. The heat accumulates over time because the insulation slows down the release of heat from the cooker to the outside environment. For insulation, we use a 5 cm layer of expanded cork on all six sides of our device. Expanded cork is a natural insulation material that provides excellent insulation. It’s made from cork waste, bound using steam. Standard cork sheets also work well.

For insulation, we use a 5 cm layer of expanded cork on all six sides of our device.

Cork is expensive, and it’s not a material you easily find on the streets. You can obtain a cheaper but more labour-intensive insulation material by cutting up discarded and second-hand wool clothes and blankets. Apart from cork and wool, there exist many other insulating materials. However, many are toxic or unpleasant to work with, and unlike cork and wool, they are often flammable. Cotton and cellulose are cheap and sustainable (waste) materials, but they do not insulate as well as cork or wool.

Image: The expanded cork insulation. Photo by Marie Verdeil. Mortar for heat storage

We made the base of our cooking device out of mortar, a material that retains a lot of heat. Thermal mass is the key to cooking after sunset. The solar panel stores heat in the oven rather than electricity in a battery. The mortar serves a dual function: it also safely encapsulates the electric heating element (see below). Every ISEC with a self-built heating element will have some thermal mass; however, we have made a thicker slab to enhance heat storage. The tiles of the oven chamber provide extra thermal mass.

The solar panel stores heat in the oven rather than electricity in a battery.

Mortar is composed of cement, sand, and water. Sold as a powder in bags, it must be mixed with water before application. You can also buy a bag of cement and mix it with sand and water to obtain mortar. Follow the instructions on the packaging for the powder-to-water ratio. Once cured, which takes several days, mortar becomes (and remains) hard. There’s no need to use refractory cement, which is made to withstand high temperatures in fireplaces and pizza ovens, because the temperature in our oven is not that high. Sand is an alternative material with a high thermal mass.

Heating element and electric system

Our oven is heated by an electric resistance element, which is connected directly to the solar panel. We initially used commercial heating elements in our prototypes, which yielded disappointing results. Therefore, we decided to build our own, based on the manual provided by the Living Energy Farm. 12 Building your own heating element involves extra work, but it’s worth the effort.

Many commercial heating elements have built-in thermostats, which can complicate temperature regulation inside the oven. They also require a voltage input that does not align with the voltage output of most solar panels, which introduces the need for an extra electronic component (a buck converter). Securely fixing commercial heating elements proved to be difficult as well, and we had trouble keeping moisture away from the electrical system; at one point, this resulted in an electrical fire.

Building your own heating element involves extra work, but it’s worth the effort.

By embedding a self-made heating element in a mortar base, we solved all these problems. A custom-made electric resistance consists of a circuit made of nichrome wire, which is an alloy of nickel and chrome. The length and thickness of the nichrome wire determine its heat dissipation and power consumption, allowing you to precisely scale the circuit according to the voltage and current produced by your solar panel. You connect the nichrome circuit to the electric cables of the solar panel, with a short section of heat-resistant electric cable in between (see our manual).

Our solar electric cooker features a thermal fuse and an internal thermostat, both of which are embedded in the mortar layer. However, these components are not necessary when operating the oven on a solar panel without a battery. Nature already provides the thermostat: once the sun goes down, the heating element stops working, making it unlikely that the oven overheats.

Image: Building your own heating element involves extra work, but it’s worth the effort. Photo by Marie Verdeil. Image: The thermal switch and fuse are seen on the first layer of mortar. Photo by Marie Verdeil. How to use the solar electric oven

Our cooking appliance can be used to cook raw food (vegetables, grains, meat, fish). It can also work as a (slow) microwave oven, warming up leftovers or a ready-made meal.

Food safety

Our oven reaches a maximum cooking temperature of about 120°C (248°F). To avoid food poisoning from potentially dangerous bacteria, food should either be refrigerated or heated to a minimum temperature of between 58 °C and 74°C (136°F-165°F), depending on the type of food, for at least 15 seconds. Cooked vegetables and fruits must reach a temperature of 58°C (136°F). Most meats and seafoods can be safely cooked at 63°C (145°F). Ground meats require a temperature of 71°C (160°F), and leftovers and poultry should reach 74°C (165°F). We monitor the temperature of the food using a food thermometer, which we inserted through the chimney hole at the top.

Image: Food made in the electric solar oven. Photo by Marie Verdeil.

Keep in mind that the temperature inside the oven will drop once you put the food inside. You should not put frozen food inside, because the temperature will drop spectacularly, and it may take many hours before a safe cooking temperature is restored. For the same reason, the oven should be preheated before the food is placed inside. However, because it’s connected to a solar panel, our oven will be at a sufficiently high temperature for most of the time. You should not keep food in the solar cooker overnight, unless you are sure it maintains a safe temperature until the morning (our cooker does not).

Image: Slow-cooked food (before and after cooking). Photo by Marie Verdeil. Cooking time

It’s perfectly possible to build an insulated solar electric cooker that cooks food just as fast as a normal oven (see further). However, it makes a lot of sense to build a low-temperature, insulated “slow cooker” instead. First, it allows you to cook with a smaller solar panel. Second, slowly cooked food tastes better and retains more of its nutrients. Third, at lower cooking temperatures, food cannot burn and for that reason you don’t need to stir it either. The inconvenience of a longer cooking time is thus compensated for by a more relaxed and easier cooking process.

On average, it takes about twice as long to cook food compared to using a conventional oven. Most meals we make, cooking raw food, take between two and four hours. Heating leftovers or a ready-made meal takes about one hour. These time spans were measured in optimal weather conditions and with a preheated oven.

Cooking after sunset

Due to the cooker’s high thermal mass, it will take several hours to heat it when you first connect it to a solar panel. However, from the second day onwards, the solar panel will keep the cooker at a continuously high temperature, even for many hours after sunset. When fully charged at sunset, reaching a temperature of approximately 120°C (248°F), our electric cooker maintains a sufficiently high temperature to cook for 4-5 hours. Once the food gets in, the temperature drops but remains high enough (above 80°C/176°F) to cook food safely. The stored heat that remains at the end of the night allows us to restart the cooking process quickly in the morning - our oven is still above 40 or 50°C (104-122°F) at sunrise.

The stored heat that remains at the end of the night allows us to restart the cooking process quickly in the morning.

Draping one or more wool blankets over the oven at sunset further increases the heat storage, allowing for cooking a meal even later in the evening, or starting cooking even earlier the next day. You can also use blankets to raise the energy efficiency of the oven during the day, resulting in a higher cooking temperature.

Moisture

Depending on the food you prepare, excessive moisture in the cooking chamber can be a problem. The water in the food may evaporate and collect in the oven space. Therefore, our oven has a small chimney through which the moisture can escape. It can be closed with a cork cap if you want to keep the moisture inside. It is a good idea to leave the oven door open occasionally so that any moisture in the insulation layer can evaporate.

Alternative cooker designs

Because we shaped our cooker around an oven tray, it’s mostly suited for oven dishes. However, other designs are possible. An earlier prototype we built has a heat chamber the size of a soup pot, and so that one is better suited to prepare stews and soups. Whatever form you choose, it’s always a good idea to dimension your cooker around a specific cooking utensil. If you put a small pot into a large oven chamber, you will waste a significant amount of energy heating empty space.

Image: An earlier prototype we built has a heat chamber the size of a soup pot, and so that one is better suited to prepare stews and soups. Photo by Marie Verdeil. Thicker insulation

The thicker the insulation layer, the more energy efficient the oven will be. A thicker insulation layer allows you to use a smaller solar panel for the same cooking time, or a faster cooking time using the same solar panel. A thicker insulation will also improve the heat storage. However, keep in mind that the device’s volume will increase exponentially. Another 5 cm of insulation on all six sides would have made our oven’s size unpractical for most kitchens.

Higher cooking temperature

If you want a solar electric cooker that cooks faster at a higher temperature, you should choose a larger solar panel and a more powerful heating element, and you should raise the setting of the thermostat and thermal fuse. Adding extra insulation also accelerates the cooking time. However, please note that we did not test our building materials at higher temperatures; therefore, proceed at your own risk.

Much depends on the local customs surrounding eating times, especially dinner. For example, European dinner times vary from about 17:00 to 19:00 in northern countries to between 21:00 and 23:00 in southern countries. The early dinner times in the north align with solar cooking. However, the late dinner times in the south would require more powerful cookers with higher temperatures and more thermal storage to cook after sunset, or to safely store a warm dish prepared in the morning.

More or less heat storage

While a solar electric cooker always needs insulation, you can build it with little or no thermal mass. The choice depends on how you want to use the device. With little to no thermal mass, the cooking appliance will heat up and cool down relatively quickly, and it will be somewhat lighter. But it won’t be able to cook after sunset. Many of the ISECs built by others are of this type.

On the other hand, it’s also possible to create a larger version of our solar cooker that can be used to cook for 24 hours a day. Add more thermal mass, insulation, and consider a higher oven temperature, as well as using a larger solar panel and a more powerful electric resistance. Such a cooking device would always be ready to use immediately, without any need for electricity storage, and it could work in industral kitchens or as a community cooking appliance.

You could also build a solar electric cooker with a heat storage consisting of metal rather than mortar. It does not allow you to cook after sunset, but it does enable you to reach higher cooking temperatures for a short time. That makes it possible to bake and fry food.

Step by step buiding guide Image: Exploded isometric drawing of our insulated solar electric oven. Illustration by Marie Verdeil. What you need Cooking utensil

• Oven tray. To hold the food that you are cooking in the oven. This tray, which can be made of metal, ceramics, or heat-resistant glass, is the first thing to obtain, as you will dimension the oven around it.

Electric heating element & electrical system (see our separate manual)

• 100W solar panel.
• Nichrome wire.
• Heat-resistant electric cable.
• Thermal switch.
• Thermal fuse.

Structural materials

• Wood boards. The oven is built around a wooden structure. You can reuse an existing box or make it from scratch. Reclaimed wood or chipboard is fine, since none of it will be visible.
• Tiles. We use tiles for both the interior of the cooking chamber and the exterior of the oven.
• Wood screws.
• Hinges and hooks. To attach the oven door.
• Feet for the oven. We made these out of wood. Feet make it easier to lift and move the oven, and they protect the oven against water damage from below.
• Handle for the oven door. We made one out of wood.

Insulation materials

• Expanded cork boards. We used 5 cm thick expanded cork boards as insulation on all sides. We used roughly 1 m2 of expanded cork. You can also use regular cork or wool insulation. Avoid flammable materials such as cotton, wood chips, or any oil-based insulation material. Cork and wool are fire-resistant materials.
• Thin cork sheets (4 mm). You place them as a sealant between the oven door and body. You also use them to fill in the height differences between the expanded cork layers above the oven chamber.

Heat storage material

• Construction mortar. We use mortar to provide thermal mass for heat storage and to embed the electric resistance heater.

Fixing & filling materials

• Adhesive mortar. To fix the tiles to wood and cork surfaces.
• Grout. To fill up the space between the tiles.

Extra components

• Food thermometer. You need one with a long sensor, as it will have to travel through the thick insulation layer at the top to reach the food.
• Chimney pipe. Roll a tube of thin aluminum sheet, which you can cut out of a soda can. Alternatively, buy a metal tube of the correct size.

Tools

• Screwdriver
• Wood saw
• Drill (you need a concrete drill bit for the chimney opening)
• Soldering iron and tin
• Tile cutter (optional if you find the right size of tiles)
• Measuring tools
• Utility knife
• Mortar trowel and mixing container

Step 1: Build the structure Image: Step-by-step instructions (fig 1. to 4.). Illustration by Marie Verdeil.

• Obtain an oven tray and measure it. We dimensioned our cooking device around a stainless steel tray approximately the size of an A4 sheet: 20 cm x 27 cm.
• fig 1. — Using tiles, create a box around the tray with enough room to slide in and out easily. The box will become the inner chamber of the solar cooker. For now, keep the structure together with tape. When determining the dimensions of the heating chamber, leave some space at the top of the oven tray to allow for heat circulation. Ideally, you find tiles that have the correct dimensions. Otherwise, cut the tiles to the correct dimensions using a tile cutter.
• Measure the exterior dimensions of the tiled oven chamber to calculate the dimensions of the wooden box that will surround it. Add 5 cm of space on all six sides to fit the expanded cork layer. At the bottom, add about 2-3 cm extra to account for the mortar, which will embed the heating element. Add 5 mm to the dimensions on all sides to ensure everything fits.
• fig 2. — Build the wooden box according to the calculated dimensions (don’t forget to add the wood thickness). Screw the wood together in a way that allows for the removal of the upper part later in the building process (see step 3). Measure everything a few times before you start cutting the wood, as it’s easy to make mistakes.
• fig 2-3. — To make sure that the door neatly aligns with the rest of the wood box, build the structure as a whole and then cut away (saw) the door part off the box. The door part needs to be 6 cm deep to fit in the insulating cork layer and the oven chamber tile on that side.
• fig 4. — Once you have cut the wood, unscrew the top board to gain better access inside.

Image: The oven chamber inside the wood structure. The space in between will be filled up with cork insulation and a mortar layer at the bottom. Photo by Marie Verdeil. Step 2: Make the electric heat resistance

• Create a resistive heating element using Nichrome wire. See our separate manual for instructions.

Step 3: Add insulation, create the heat storage and add the electric heat resistance Image: Step-by-step instructions (fig 5. to 8.). Illustration by Marie Verdeil.

• fig 5. — Using a thin saw or utility knife, cut and glue the expanded cork insulation boards to cover all sides of the area. You can use wood glue or hot glue. Keep the top board apart to add it later.
• fig 6. — Mix some construction mortar with water and create a layer of about 10-15 mm on the bottom cork layer. Leave it to set for a couple of hours.
• fig 6. — At the back of the box, about 10mm above the mortar layer, pierce a hole through the cork and wood to channel the electric cables through.
• fig 7. — Place the resistance circuit on top of the mortar bed and drive the heat-resistant cable endings through the hole in the back of the box. Make sure the nichrome wires don’t cross or touch, and that the (optional) fuse and thermal switch are also lying on top of the mortar.
• fig 8. — Pour another 10-15 mm of mortar to cover the circuit.

Image: The first layer of mortar with the nichrome circuit, thermal switch, and thermal fuse on top. All these components will be hidden in the second layer of mortar. Photo by Marie Verdeil. Phase 4: Fix the cooking chamber in place and complete the insulation Image: Step-by-step instructions (fig 9. to 16.). Illustration by Marie Verdeil.

• fig 9. — Take the tiles you prepared for the inner chamber. Place some mortar at the back of the bottom tiles and press them onto the mortar bed.
• fig 10. — Using adhesive mortar, fix the remaining tiles to the sides and back of the cork boards, recreating the oven chamber that you taped together in step 1.
• fig 11. — Using a drill with a concrete drill bit, make a 10-12 mm hole in the center top tile to fit an air vent chimney.
• fig 11. — Lay the remaining top tiles to rest on the edges of the side tiles with a bit more mortar. It is a good idea to tilt the top tiles slightly to one side to guide condensation moisture away from the food tray.
• fig 12. — Before placing back the top cork board on top of the inner tile chamber, mark the position of the chimney and drill through the cork and wooden boards.
• fig 12-13. — Place the top corkboard on the top tiles with a bit of adhesive mortar and screw back the top wooden board to close the box. If there are some air gaps, fill them in with cork scraps or sheets to prevent heat leakage.
• fig 14. — Glue 4 mm thick cork sheets to the box insulation that surrounds the oven chamber on the front. Use wood glue. This extra layer helps to close the door tightly and prevents any heat from escaping.
• fig 15. — Insulate the door by fitting a 5 cm expanded cork board inside with wood glue. Using a bit more adhesive mortar, place the last tile on the door, making sure it aligns and closes the inner chamber when the wood box is closed.
• fig 16. — Glue another 4mm corksheet to mirror the chamber’s edge.

The box is now mostly finished. Let everything dry/cure for at least 48 hours.

Image: Fixing the cooking chamber. Photo by Marie Verdeil. Step 5: Finishing touches Image: Step-by-step instructions (fig 17. to 19.). Illustration by Marie Verdeil.

• fig 17. — Tile the box top to make it waterproof and heat-resistant (you can put the oven tray there when it comes out of the oven). Ensure that you leave a hole for the chimney.
• Make and insert the chimney. Fit it into the hole you made.
• Grouting. Seal the inner tile chamber with grout to prevent moisture from entering the cork insulation. Do the same for the exterior tiles and for the joint with the chimney. We also added plaster on the sides to protect the wood.
• fig 18. — Add a handle to the door.
• fig 19. — Add hinges to attach the door to the oven body using screws. Place a metal latch on each side to tightly lock the door during operation.
• Add small feet to the oven to make it easier to lift and to protect it against water damage.
• The oven is finished!
• Connect the heat-resistant cables sticking out of the oven to the wires of the solar panel. Insert an on/off switch between them (on the positive wire).

Image: Some assembly steps for the oven (from left to right): Fig.1: Drilling a hole for the chimney, with all insulation in place. Fig.2: Extra layer of cork to cover the door and box insulation. Fig.3: Tiling the exterior of the solar electric oven. Fig.4: Grouting. Photos by Marie Verdeil. Credits

• Concept: Kris De Decker, with input from Marie Verdeil.
• Design: Marie Verdeil, with input from Anna Mareschal de Charentenay.
• Construction & documentation: Marie Verdeil, with assistance from Hugo Lopez.
• Design & construction of two earlier prototypes: Vaiva Vinskaité, with input from Kris De Decker and Marie Verdeil.
• Thanks to: Samira Allaouat & Alexandra Tollefsrud for the tiles. AkashaHub Barcelona for the workspace. Living Energy Farm & Cal Poly for their pioneering work on insulated solar electric cookers.

1. In affluent, industrialised societies, cooking is rarely seen as a problem when it comes to resource use and carbon emissions. For example, in the US, only around 5% of a household’s energy use is attributed to cooking devices (such as stovetops, ovens, microwaves, and water kettles). However, while cooking requires relatively little energy, it requires a lot of power. Energy consumption equals power consumption multiplied by time. Since cooking devices are only used for a short time during the day, their energy consumption is relatively low. However, their high power use makes it challenging to operate them on an off-grid solar PV system. ↩︎

2. Direct Solar Power: Off-Grid Without Batteries, Kris De Decker, Low-tech Magazine, August 2023. https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2023/08/direct-solar-power-off-grid-without-batteries/ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎

3. Too Much Combustion, Too Little Fire, Kris De Decker, Low-tech Magazine, December 2019. https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2019/12/too-much-combustion-too-little-fire/ ↩︎

4. How to Get Your Apartment Off the Grid, Kris De Decker, Low-tech Magazine, May 2016. https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2016/05/how-to-get-your-apartment-off-the-grid/ ↩︎

5. The first recorded use of the solar box cooker goes back to the eighteenth century when the increased use of glass made people aware of its ability to trap solar heat. For more information, see Hirst, Eric. “A golden thread: 2500 years of solar architecture and technology: by Ken Butti and John Perlin Cheshire Books, distributed by Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, New York and London, 1980, 304 pp,£ 11.95.” (1981): 167. /// Daniels, Farrington. Direct use of the sun’s energy. Yale University Press, 1964. /// Telkes, Maria. “Solar cooking ovens.” Solar Energy 3.1 (1959): 1-11]. ↩︎

6. If We Insulate Our Houses, Why Not Our Cooking Pots?, Kris De Decker, Low-tech Magazine, July 2014. https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2014/07/if-we-insulate-our-houses-why-not-our-cooking-pots/ ↩︎

7. Find an example of a manual here: https://reclaimdesign.org/diy-solar-oven ↩︎

8. Although glass plates reduce the heat losses from the oven interior somewhat, they cannot offer the same level of thermal resistance as a thick layer of wool or cork. ↩︎

9. See: https://sharedcurriculum.peteschwartz.net/isecooker-construction/ ↩︎

10. See: https://livingenergyfarm.org/insulated-solar-electric-cooker/ ↩︎

11. It may seem unusual to build an oven from materials such as wood, cork, or wool. However, the temperature reached inside our oven does not pose any risk for these materials. Cork and wool are thermally stable up to approximately 200°C and start to degrade above that temperature. They are fire-resistant materials: they don’t ignite and won’t spread fire. Wood does not ignite at temperatures below 250ºC. Furthermore, all these materials are separated from the heating element and the interior oven chamber by mortar and tiles, which resist much higher temperatures. When we had an electrical fire in one of our first prototypes, the fire did not spread. ↩︎

12. See: https://conev.org/ISECmanual14.pdf ↩︎

A listing of 24 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, October 5, 2025 thru Sat, October 11, 2025. Stories we promoted this week, by category:

Climate Change Impacts (7 articles)

• Climate change behind 36% of damage inflicted by Typhoon Ragasa in China "In the Atlantic, we’re watching a tropical wave that emerged from the coast of Africa on October 3 that might develop in about a week as it approaches the Lesser Antilles Islands." Eye on the Storm, Yale Climate Connections, Jeff Masters, Oct 3, 2025.
• Most of the world has recently set all-time heat records Regional exceptions like the 1930s in the continental US notwithstanding The Climate Brink, Zeke Hausfather, Oct 06, 2025.
• Climate change may create 'ecological trap' for species who can't adapt Phys.org, Case Western Reserve University, Oct 07, 2025.
• Billions of Birds Vanishing Across America as Climate Chaos Disrupts Migration - Experts Warn 'We're Next' International Business News, Justin Price, Oct 07, 2025.
• Climate change is not a `con job` TheHill.com, Rebecca Vega Thurber, opinion contributor , Oct 09, 2025.
• Arctic seals and more than half of bird species are in trouble on latest list of threatened species Phys.org, Melina Walling, Oct 10, 2025.
• Destined to melt: Study warns glaciers' ability to cool surrounding air faces imminent decline Phys.org, Institute of Science and Technology Austria, Oct 10, 2025.

Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation (3 articles)

• Carbon offsets fail to cut global heating due to `intractable` systemic problems, study says Analysis of 25 years of evidence shows most schemes are poor quality and fail to lower emissions The Guardian, Ajit Niranjan, Oct 06, 2025.
• Will your next EV have a solid-state battery — and improved performance? "Superionic materials have spawned hope for a new generation of power packs for electric cars, with a promise of greater range, faster charges and more safety. But scaling up won’t be easy." Knowable Magazine/Yale Climate Connections,, M. Mitchell Waldrop, Oct 6, 2025.
• Q&A: How countries are using biofuels to meet their climate targets From canola farmers in Canada to car owners in India, biofuels have become the subject of everyday debate across the world. Carbon Brief, Aruna Chandrasekhar, Oct 08, 2025.

Climate Science and Research (3 articles)

• Antarctic Sea ice emerges as key predictor of accelerated ocean warming Press Release, European Geosciences Union (EGU), Asmae Ourkiya , Oct 2, 2025.
• Skeptical Science New Research for Week #41 2025 This edition of Skeptical Science's weekly academic climate research review includes 113 articles from 50 journals, involving 582 researchers. Skeptical Science, Doug Bostrom & Marc Kodack, Oct 09, 2025.
• Can tech help us fight climate change? Dr Gilbz on Youtube, Ella Gilbert, Oct 9, 2025.

Climate Policy and Politics (2 articles)

• Pope Leo faces MAGA ire after immigration and climate change remarks CNN, Opinion by Christopher Lamb, Oct 4, 2025.
• National security threatened by climate crisis, UK intelligence chiefs due to warn Report by joint intelligence committee delayed, with concerns expressed that it may not be published The Guardian, Fiona Harvey and Helena Horton, Oct 08, 2025.

Miscellaneous (2 articles)

• 2025 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #40 A listing of 25 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, September 28, 2025 thru Sat, October 4, 2025. Skeptical Science, Bärbel Winkler, John Hartz & Doug Bostrom, Oct 05, 2025.
• Central Atlantic disturbance 95L likely to develop "The system is likely to be near the Leeward Islands on Thursday or Friday." Eye on the Storm, Yale Climate Connections, Jeff Masters, O?ct 6, 2025.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Science (2 articles)

• Liars and blockers: The rising threat of climate disinformation and misinformation Track Changes on Youtube, Murray Griffin, Sep 21, 2025.
• Fact brief - Do errors in Al Gore's 'An Inconvenient Truth' disprove climate change? No - While Gore’s 2006 documentary proved incorrect about the extent and timeline of some predictions, it does not negate the reality, confirmed by decades of peer-reviewed evidence, that humans are warming the planet. Skeptical Science, Sue Bin Park, Oct 07, 2025.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Solutions (2 articles)

• Media and political attacks on Australia`s emissions targets `straight out of the climate obstruction playbook`, expert says Prof Christian Downie points to the Business Council of Australia and News Corp newspapers as examples of deliberate obstruction The Guardian, Graham Readfearn, Oct 07, 2025.
• After Spain's blackout, critics blamed renewable energy. It's part of a bigger attack When the power went out in Spain this spring, many theories about the blackout centered around renewable energy. A new expert panel report contradicts the narrative that too much solar and wind was to blame. NPR, Julia Simon, Oct 8, 2025.

Climate Education and Communication (1 article)

• The Cranky Uncle game can now be played in 17 languages! For version 3.10 we added Polish to the Cranky Uncle game which can now be played in 17 languages! Skeptical Science, Bärbel Winkler, Oct 10, 2025.

Health Aspects of Climate Change (1 article)

• As Trump Denies Climate Change, At Least 170 Hospitals Face Major Flood Risk KFF Health News, Brett Kelman, Oct 10, 2025.

International Climate Conferences and Agreements (1 article)

• It Isn’t Just the U.S. The Whole World Has Soured on Climate Politics. "How do we think about the climate future, now that the era marked by the Paris Agreement has so utterly disappeared?" New York Times Magazine, David Wallace-Wells, Oct 16, 2025.

If you happen upon high quality climate-science and/or climate-myth busting articles from reliable sources while surfing the web, please feel free to submit them via this Google form so that we may share them widely. Thanks!

Headline News:

• “As Renewables In China Surge, Some Questions Are Raised” • China built the Three Gorges Dam, the largest hydro project in its history, in 15 years, ending in 2006. Keith Bradsher reports in the New York Times, that it adds enough solar panels to match the output from the Three Gorges Dam every three weeks. But that creates some questions. [CleanTechnica]

Three Gorges Dam (Hugh, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped)

• “Switzerland Renewable Power Generation To Reach 31.4 TWh In 2035” • Switzerland is advancing its clean energy transition, supported by a strong large hydropower and pumped storage dominance, solar PV expansion, and policies aimed at achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. However, nuclear power is planned to be phased out. [MSN]
• “Researchers Find Methane Leaking Out Of Cracks In The Antarctic Seabed” • Methane has been measured escaping from crevices in the seabed at a high rate as the region warms at unprecedented rates, according to a paper published in Nature Communications. Researchers described the leaks as “seemingly widespread” throughout the region. [ABC News]
• “The Space Solar Power Revolution Is Well Underway” • As they seek to support a global green transition and accelerate the shift away from fossil fuels, scientists have discussed beaming solar power from space, but until now it seemed like a pipe dream. However, thanks to technological innovations, it may soon be possible. [Yahoo]
• “Small Agrivoltaic Project, Big Implications For The Future Of Farming” • US farmers are facing hard times, with many going bankrupt. A new agrivoltaic project in Virginia aims to show that the new energy crop of the 21st century – solar energy, that is – can help provide a lifeline to farmers and local communities in these challenging times. [CleanTechnica]

For more news, please visit geoharvey – Daily News about Energy and Climate Change.

Image: A removable heat brick, consisting of a nichrome circuit sandwiched between two identical tiles. It rests upon an insulated solar electric cooking device. Photo by Marie Verdeil.

This manual documents the building of an electric resistance heating element that is directly connected to a solar panel, without a battery, charge controller, or voltage regulator in between. The heating element is used in the insulated solar electric cooker that we describe in another manual, and in the solar-powered coffee maker and footstove that we will document in forthcoming manuals. We also describe a method to make a removable heat brick, which we use to replace the commercial heating elements in some earlier electric solar cooker prototypes we made.

A custom-made electric resistance consists of an electric circuit made of nichrome wire, enclosed in a mortar layer. The length and thickness of the nichrome wire determine its current draw at a certain voltage, meaning that you dimension the circuit to your solar panel voltage and power rating to optimize heat generation. The nichrome circuit is connected to the electric cables of the solar panel, with a short section of heat-resistant electric cable in between. 1

Why build an electric resistance heating from scratch?

We initially used commercial heating elements in our first solar oven prototypes, which yielded disappointing results. Therefore, we decided to build our own, based on the manual provided by the Living Energy Farm. Building your own heating element involves extra work, but it’s worth the effort. It’s also a lot cheaper.

Many commercial heating elements have built-in thermostats, which can complicate temperature regulation inside the oven. They also require a voltage input that does not align with the voltage output of most solar panels, which introduces the need for an extra electronic component (a buck converter). Securely fixing commercial heating elements proved to be difficult as well, and we had trouble keeping moisture away from the electrical system, which at one point resulted in an electrical fire. By embedding a self-made heating element in a mortar base, we solved all these problems.

Image: Our first solar oven prototype was powered by three commercially available heating elements, with disappointing results. Photo by Kris De Decker. What is electric resistance heating?

Electric resistance refers to the difficulty that the flow of electric current encounters when it passes through a material. It’s comparable to friction in mechanical systems. Resistance creates heat, as described by Joule’s Law. Electric resistance is measured in ohms (Ω).

The resistance of a piece of wire depends on its material’s resistivity, but also on its length and thickness. Metals have low electrical resistance, meaning that electricity easily flows through them; they are called “conductors”. For example, electric wires are usually made of copper, which has very low electric resistance.

In contrast, materials such as plastic, rubber, and ceramics have very high electric resistance, meaning that electricity doesn’t flow easily through them. These materials are known as “insulators”. For example, electric wires are encapsulated in plastic, which makes them safe to touch.

Electric heating elements, such as those used in ovens, toasters, and hair dryers, are commonly made of nichrome wire, an alloy of nickel and chromium that has relatively high resistance for a metal. Electrons can pass through, but because they encounter quite some resistance, the nichrome wire dissipates a lot of heat. It glows orange when it heats up.

Image: A nichrome wire in a hair dryer. Photo by Dasha Ilina. What you need

In the components list below, we link to Amazon, using it as a global inventory of components. Feel free—and be encouraged—to buy the components locally, or scavenge them from old appliances. We do not earn anything if you purchase on Amazon.

• Nichrome wire. Other example. Nichrome wire is sold in either bobbins or spools. You can also scavenge it from old ovens, toasters, hair driers, and other electric heating devices.
• Heat-resistant electric cable. These electric wires are encapuslated in silicone mesh rather than plastic.
• Thermal switch (optional).
• Thermal fuse (optional).
• Construction mortar for encapsulating the nichrome circuit.
• Thick tiles (in case you build a removable heat brick).

Image: The nichrome circuit, soldered to a pair of heat-resistant electric cables. Photo by Marie Verdeil. Calculate the resistance value

The challenge in building an electric resistance heating element is determining the correct length of the nichrome circuit to match the voltage and current rating of the power source.

To determine the length of the nichrome circuit, you need to calculate the desired resistance value that corresponds to your power source. You can calculate it using Ohm’s law, which defines the relation between voltage (Volts, V), current (Ampere, A), and resistance (Ohm, Ω):

Resistance (Ω) = U (V) / I (A)

To determine the voltage and current values of your solar panel, refer to the label attached to the back of the panel.

For the voltage, check the “Maximum Power Voltage (Vmax)” or “Voltage at Pmax”. That refers to the maximum voltage that a solar panel can provide when connected to an electric circuit. Ignore the “Voltage Open Circuit (VOC)”, which is the maximum voltage the solar panel produces if nothing is attached to it.

For a so-called 12V solar panel (so-called because it’s typically used in conjunction with a 12V battery and solar charge controller), the Vmax is approximately 18V. For a so-called 24V solar panel (meant to be used in combination with a 24V battery and charge controller), it’s around 36V.

For the current, check the “Maximum Power Current (IMP)” or “Current at Pmax”. Ignore the “Short Circuit Current”. If the label is missing, measure the voltage with a multimeter. You can calculate the current once you know the voltage and power output: electric current equals the power output (100W in our case) divided by the voltage (18V in our case). The maximum current that our 100W solar panel can produce is therefore 5.55 A.

Once you know the voltage and current of your solar panel, you can calculate the desired resistance value for the heating element using Ohm’s Law. In our case:

18 (V) / 5.55 (A) = 3.24 Ω

Calculate the length of the heating wire

The next step is to cut a piece of nichrome wire that has a resistance of 3.24 Ω. Nichrome wire is sold in various thicknesses, each with a different resistance value. The thinner (and longer) a resistive wire is, the higher its resistance will be. The resistance of a nichrome wire is indicated in ohms per distance (for example, Ω/m).

We purchased a relatively thin Nichrome wire with a rated resistance of 8.71 Ω/m. Following the mathematical Rule of Three, based on the resistance per meter, we find that our nichrome circuit needs to be 37.2 cm long to have a resistance value of 3.24 Ω: (100 * 3.24) / 8.71 = 37.2 cm. If you start with a different thickness of Nichrome wire (anything goes), you will obtain a different length.

Don’t trust the labeling

Unfortunately, the resistance value on the nichrome wire packaging isn’t always exact. To obtain a more accurate measurement, cut precisely one metre of nichrome wire and connect it to the solar panel (or to an 18V test station - see further below) with a watt-meter or multimeter in between. Follow the same method when you use scavenged nichrome wire from an appliance.

Connect one end of the wire to the positive output of the solar panel or test station, and the other to the negative output, forming an electric circuit. The polarity doesn’t matter.

Turn the power on, read the amperage and wattage values on your watt meter, and turn it off immediately afterward. Be careful when connecting the wire; make sure it doesn’t touch itself, as this would create a shorter circuit for the electricity. Your measurement will be inaccurate, but it will also draw a lot more current (A) and heat much faster, which can be dangerous. Make sure you don’t touch it either because it gets very hot.

Doing this, we measured 31W at 1.76A and 18V. Based on Ohm’s Law, we calculated that 18 V / 1.76 A = 10.2 Ω. Consequently, our wire has a resistance of 10.2 Ω/m rather than 8.71 Ω/m. That means that it should have a length of 31.7 cm to have a resistance value of 3.24 Ω:

(100 * 3.24) / 10.2 = 31.7 cm.

Image: Testing the first two solar oven prototypes with a grid-powered test station. Photo by Marie Verdeil. Doubling or tripling the cable

However, it’s still too early to cut the nichrome wire to size. Depending on the wire’s resistive value that you are starting with, the length that results from your calculation may not be the most practical length for spreading the heat evenly across the surface of your heating or cooking appliance.

For example, the bottom part of our solar oven chamber, right above the electric resistance heating element, measures 26x33 centimeters. With a circuit less than 32 cm long, it’s impossible to heat the oven chamber evenly. A short wire would also create a very warm spot in the mortar and damage it.

This can be solved by connecting two or more nichrome wires in parallel. If you double the circuit, each wire should be twice as long (63,4 cm each in our case) to keep the same resistance value. If you triple the circuit, each wire should be three times as long (95,1 cm each), and so on.

This may feel counterintuitive, but the longer a cable is, the higher its resistance becomes: electrons will have more difficulty travelling through it. When you double the nichrome cicuit by creating two parallel wires, the electrons can flow in two circuits simultaneously, which means the resitance is halved. Therefore, to keep the same resistance value of 3.24 ohm, you have to make this double circuit twice as long. The same logic applies to a triple wires, where you have to make the circuit three times as long.

Image: Showing different layouts for the nichrome circuit, using one, two, or three cables in parallel. They are all equivalent in resistance. Illustration by Marie Verdeil. Cut the nichrome wire to size

Once you have decided on the number of nichrome circuits, cut the wires to size. However, before you do that, add about 4 cm to every wire. You will need this extra length to solder the nichrome wire to the heat-resistant electric cables (see further).

Coiling the wire Image: Coiling the wire around a screwdriver. Illustration by Marie Verdeil.

Doubling the circuit, as we did in our solar oven, quadruples the total circuit length. That turns one problem (a too-short cable) into another one (too-long cables). However, it can be solved by coiling the wire, which has an additional advantage: The thin nichrome wire becomes much easier to handle and bend when it’s coiled like a spring. You can do this by wrapping it tightly around a rod-shaped object, such as a pen or a screwdriver. Next, you pull the wire to extend it slightly again.

Thermal switch and fuse

An electric resistance heating element needs a safety precaution to prevent overheating, which could become a fire hazard or crack the mortar enclosure. If the heating element is connected to a solar panel without a battery, as is the case for our solar oven, you could argue that it already has a safety precaution: the sun sets every evening, cutting off the power source to the heating element.

However, if you also want to run the cooking appliance on a battery or with a grid-powered test station, you should add a safety precaution that cuts off the heating element if you forget to turn it off.

One way to do that is to add a timer switch. That is a component that controls an electric switch and turns it off after a predetermined time has elapsed. The second approach, which we chose, is to add a thermal switch and a thermal fuse. These components disconnect the circuit when the heating element reaches a certain temperature.

The thermal switch cuts off the heating circuit when its temperature reaches the rated temperature, and turns it back on when the temperature drops below a slightly lower value. The thermal fuse is an extra safety measure: it’s a single-use fuse that blows when it reaches its rated temperature. The thermal fuse should have a higher value than the thermal switch. You embed it in the cement layer, and once it blows, it’s impossible to replace without breaking the oven.

Image: The thermal switch and fuse on a first layer of mortar in our third solar oven prototype. Photo by Marie Verdeil.

We selected a switch with a maximum temperature rating of 200°C (392°F) and a fuse with a maximum temperature rating of 240°C (464°F). Note that the temperature measured inside the oven chamber will be lower than the temperature of the electric heating element. For example, our thermal switch turns off the circuit at 200°C when the oven chamber is around 120°C (248°F).

You can choose a thermal switch and fuse with a higher temperature. However, we cannot guarantee that the structural materials we used for our oven can withstand higher temperatures than those we use.

Connect the thermal switch and the thermal fuse in series (one after the other) between the nichrome circuit and the positive heat-resistant wire (the one that connects to the positive wire of the solar panel). Ensure the fuse and switch are embedded in the mortar to obtain an accurate temperature reading. Both switch and fuse have no polarity, which means you can connect their pins in either direction.

Solder the nichrome wires to the electric cables

Once the nichrome circuit is cut and coiled, you need to connect it to the electric cables from the solar PV panel. However, you cannot simply solder one to the other: the nichrome wires get hot and would burn the plastic casing of the electric cables. To prevent that, you need to install a pair of heat-resistant electric cables in between.

First, you solder the nichrome wire to the heat-resistance cable. If you want to add a switch and/or fuse (see above), it should go in between the heat-resistant cable and the nichrome wire. Then, you connect the heat-resistant cables to normal electric cables or directly to the solar panel cables (using any type of connector). You also want to put an on-off switch in the positive wire.

In summary, the circuit components should be connected in the following order: positive PV cable, on/off switch, heat-resistant cable, (optional) thermal switch, (optional) thermal fuse, and nichrome circuit.

Image: Soldering the nichrome wire to the heat-resistant electric cable. Step by step instructions. Illustration by Marie Verdeil.

Soldering the nichrome wire to the heat-resistant electric cable is a bit complicated because the nichrome doesn’t stick with tin solder. However, you can get around that problem. Start by applying tin to your stripped heat-resistant electric cable strand (fig2.). Then, coil a few centimeters of the nichrome wire around the cable ends (these are the extra centimeters you added before cutting the nichrome wire to size) (fig 3.). Next, apply a generous amount of tin on top of the twisted wire to trap it onto the cable (fig4.).

Electric cables come in different thicknesses, measured in mm² in Europe or AWG in the US. The higher the current that flows through it, the thicker an electric cable needs to be. Our circuit works at 5.555A, which requires a 1.5 mm² core wire area. The US equivalent is 16 or 14 AWG. Both the heat-resistant wire and the standard electric cable should follow this size requirement. If you have a different current draw, refer to the chart below to determine the required size. If you plan to use a very long cable between the solar panel and the cooking device, choose a thicker cable.

Image: Chart for AWG vs. mm2 sizes Encapsulating the heating element

Once the electric resistance heating element is ready, it needs to be encapsulated in mortar, a heat-resistant material with high thermal inertia. We describe two methods for doing that.

1. Encapsulte the heating element in the device itself

The first method involves encapsulating the nichrome circuit within the structure of a specific cooking or heating appliance. That is how our electric solar oven works: the heating element is embedded into a layer of mortar at the bottom of the cooker, between the insulation layer and the oven chamber (where the food goes). See the manual for the construction steps.

Image: Electric resistance in a mortar bed. Photo by Marie Verdeil. 2. Encapsulate the heating element in a removable heat brick

The second method yields a tiled heating brick that can be inserted into various cooking appliances. In this case, the nichrome circuit is embedded in construction mortar and sandwiched between two identical tiles. The two heat-resistant electric cables protrude from one side, ready to be connected to a solar panel. It’s essential to use somewhat thicker and stronger tiles for this purpose, for example, terracotta floor or roof tiles. Thinner tiles may shatter due to the heat.

Image: A removable heat brick at the bottom of our second solar oven prototype. Photo by Marie Verdeil.

We use these removable heating bricks to power the first two solar oven prototypes that we made. It’s a less energy-efficient method, but if the nichrome circuit breaks, you don’t need to rebuild the entire cooking device.

The Living Energy Farm, which inspired the building of our own resistance heating elements, casts the nichrome circuit into a metal shell that they make themselves using sheet metal. However, in contrast to a tiled heating brick, a sheet metal casing requires skills and tools that are not so common. 2

Image: The electric resistance heating circuit embedded in mortar and sandwiched between two tiles. Photo by Marie Verdeil. Assembly of the heating brick Image: How to build an electric resistance heating brick from scratch, step-by-step instructions. Photo by Marie Verdeil.

1. fig 1-2. Place one of the tiles with the back side facing up, apply a dollop of mortar, and flatten it across the tile, almost to the edges.

2. fig 3. Place the electric resistance circuit on top of the mortar. Make sure the wires don’t touch or cross, as this would create a short circuit. Try to evenly distribute the wire across the surface to distribute the heat evenly, but avoid the edges to prevent the nichrome wire from sticking out. Leave at least 3-5 cm of heat-resistant electric wire protruding from the tile on one side, so that you can solder or otherwise connect it to a standard electrical cable.

3. fig 4-6. Add a little bit of mortar on the other tile and press it on top of the other like a sandwich. Leave it to dry out for at least 48 hours.

Setting up a test station for electric heating resistance heaters

A test station is convenient for testing resistance heating elements designed to operate on solar panels. Such a test station consists of a DC power supply and a buck or boost converter. It allows you to simulate the solar panel’s power output using grid power. A test station also serves to measure the precise resistance value of 1m of nichrome wire.

A 12V or 24V DC power supply converts 110/220-240V AC power into DC power, comparable to the electricity produced by a solar panel. Choose one with a capacity of at least the power output of your solar panel (100W in our case). If you connect a buck or boost converter to it, you can manipulate the 12V or 24V output voltage into a higher or a lower voltage. Since our heating resistance runs on a solar panel without a battery or charge controller (Vmax = 18V), you can match the buck or boost converter to an output of 18V.

Image: Setting up a test station, using a DC power supply (left) or a laptop adapter (right). Illustration by Marie Verdeil.

To wire it, connect a + and - cable to the DC supply into the buck or boost converter. Use a boost converter to step up the voltage from a DC supply below 18V, or a buck converter to lower he voltage drom a 24V power supply.

If you build an electric heating resistance that you want to run on a 12V or 24V battery, you only need the DC power supply (with a voltage output of 12 or 24V, respectively).

If you are short on cash, you can use a laptop adapter instead of a DC power supply. The DC output of a laptop adapter is printed on the adapter itself. It’s typically around 70-90W at 19-20V. While it won’t be able to power a 100W solar cooker at full strength, it’s suitable for testing the circuit, and you can obtain it for free. If you have a lot of money, you can also purchase an adjustable lab DC supply, which allows you to adjust the voltage and current outputs using knobs.

Other types of power sources

In case you want to build a heating element that runs on a 12V or 24V battery and solar charge controller, the voltage value for your calculation is 12V or 24V, respectively. The current depends on the wattage that you want to achieve. For example, if you have a 12V power source and you want a 100W heating element, you need 8.33A. If you have a 24V power source and you want a 100W heating element, you need 4.17A.

Image: Chart of common power sources with their power ratings and the resistance value needed to make the heating element work at full power.

1. A different style of DIY heating resistance uses diodes, connected in series, as an alternative to electric resistance wire. Find more information in this paper ↩︎

2. One way around this is to use an existing metal cookie box or a large tin can bottom, but in that case, you’re stuck with the dimensions of what you can find. A metal box conducts electricity, so make sure the electric resistance wire doesn’t touch the metal. You can also pour the mortar into a plastic container and remove it once the mortar has cured. ↩︎

We Are NY

Manufacturers and Vendors Can Now Apply to Qualify and Demonstrate Packaged Window Heat Pumps in Multifamily Buildings Across the State

New Statewide Program Builds on the Clean Heat for All Pilot to Benefit More New Yorkers . 

Governor Kathy Hochul today announced $10 million is now available to increase the adoption of advanced clean heating and cooling solutions in New York through the new statewide Clean Heat for All: Window Heat Pump Demonstration program. Starting today, manufacturers and vendors can now apply to qualify and demonstrate the performance of packaged window heat pumps (PWHPs) in multifamily buildings across the state, which aim to increase consumer confidence in this emerging heat pump technology. This new statewide program builds on the success and lessons learned from the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) Clean Heat for All Pilot and will make it more affordable for the industry to advance these cost-effective, plug-and-play retrofit solutions, which can improve comfort and temperature control for New York households without the need for extensive building infrastructure upgrades. 

“Making clean energy more affordable is key to ensuring every New Yorker can benefit from our transition to a greener future,” Governor Hochul said. “Clean Heat for All demonstrates how strong partnerships and proven solutions can accelerate that transition, helping families save energy costs, improving comfort in their homes and reducing harmful emissions across the state.” 

The statewide Window Heat Pump Demonstration program, administered by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA), offers incentives to qualified manufacturers and vendors to install PWHPs for demonstration and performance monitoring in select multifamily buildings with more than five units. 

New York State Energy Research and Development Authority President and CEO Doreen M. Harris said, “The success of the Clean Heat for All program brought ground-breaking technology into the homes of New Yorkers to experience the benefits of clean, efficient heating and cooling. Through these demonstration projects, more residents and building owners will be able to experience greater comfort, control, and air quality from heat pump technology and feel confident in the switch to these low emission solutions.” 

The open enrollment opportunity consists of two concurrent phases. Starting today, under Phase One, manufacturers and vendors of PWHPs that meet a rigorous set of technical and performance criteria can now apply to qualify their clean heating and cooling products through the program. Once qualified under Phase One, they will be eligible to apply to Phase Two incentives to install and demonstrate their performance of their PWHPs in multifamily buildings. Selected projects in market rate demonstration sites will receive incentives covering 50 percent of costs up to $1,500 per PWHP. Incentives for low- and moderate-income demonstration sites will cover 75 percent of costs up to $2,250 per PWHP. 

An application for Phase One can be submitted via email to PWHPdemonstration@nyserda.ny.gov. Once NYSERDA reviews and accepts Phase One applications, applicants will become qualified participants and NYSERDA will grant access to a dedicated SharePoint site for Phase Two applications. The deadline to qualify PWHPs is January 30, 2026. The deadline to apply for incentives is June 30, 2027. More information about Phase One of the program can be found here and Phase Two can be found here. 

From the Phase Two demonstrations, NYSERDA will collect PWHP performance data in order to provide metrics and actionable insights to building owners, operators, tenants, and utilities, both in New York State and other jurisdictions with significant multifamily housing stock and cold climates. This data will be used to assess the viability of PWHPs as a cost-effective, durable space heating electrification retrofit solution. 

The Window Heat Pump Demonstration program joins NYSERDA’s Clean Heat for All portfolio, alongside the Clean Heat for All: Packaged Terminal Heat Pump program, to bring efficient heating and cooling solutions to buildings across New York State. It also builds on the success and positive results of the NYCHA Clean Heat for All Pilot, a partnership between the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), New York Power Authority (NYPA), and NYSERDA to develop and test a cold-climate window heat pump that can better serve the heating and cooling needs of existing multifamily buildings. This new demonstration program aims to enable installation and monitoring of more PWHPs and provide additional performance data, which will complement data gleaned from the previous NYCHA Pilot. 

New York Power Authority President and CEO Justin E. Driscoll said, “Through the Power Authority’s strategic partnership with NYCHA and NYSERDA, the Clean Heat for All program led to the development of energy-efficient heat pumps that can be easily installed in multifamily buildings. The continued investment in this innovative technology will make it more affordable to implement, improving comfort and climate control for New York residents.” 

New York State Homes and Community Renewal Commissioner RuthAnne Visnauskas said, “Expanding access to clean, efficient heating and cooling is essential to improving the quality of life for residents across New York, including those who live in affordable multifamily developments. The $10 million Clean Heat for All Pilot program supports HCR’s mission to preserve and improve our existing housing stock, and ensure safe, sustainable, affordable homes for all New Yorkers. By embracing and funding innovative technologies like packaged window heat pumps, we’re helping to build a healthier, more resilient housing stock for the future.” 

New York City Housing Authority Chief Executive Officer Lisa Bova-Hiatt said, “NYCHA is proud to have been the catalyst and proving ground for this innovative program. The success of the initial Clean Heat for All pilot, which was met with very positive feedback from NYCHA residents, demonstrates the viability of these window heat pumps as a key solution for providing reliable heating and cooling while improving energy efficiency. We are thrilled to be involved in driving a market transformation that will serve to benefit not only NYCHA residents, but New Yorkers statewide.” 

Urban Green Council Chief Executive Officer John Mandyck said, “We applaud NYSERDA’s new Window Heat Pump Demonstration program. It will expedite technologies that will fill important gaps in the industry and provide affordable electrification solutions for more New Yorkers.” 

For more 50 years, NYSERDA has been a trusted and objective resource for New Yorkers, taking on the critical role of energy planning and policy analysis, along with making investments that drive New York toward a more sustainable future. Buildings are one of the most significant sources of greenhouse gas emissions in New York State. Through NYSERDA and utility programs, more than $5.6 billion has been invested to decarbonize buildings and support high-efficiency all-electric heating and cooling technologies. Room heat pumps, such as PWHPs, are an important tool in the transition to a clean energy economy and have the potential to enable rapid, affordable electrification of space heating in multifamily buildings. 

This initiative is funded by the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. 

New York State’s Climate Agenda 
New York State’s climate agenda calls for an affordable and just transition to a clean energy economy that creates family-sustaining jobs, promotes economic growth through green investments, and directs a minimum of 35 percent of the benefits to disadvantaged communities. New York is advancing a suite of efforts to achieve an emissions-free economy by 2050, including in the energy, buildings, transportation, and waste sectors. 

The Civil Society and Indigenous Peoples Mechanism (CSIPM) for relations with the UN Committee on World Food Security (CFS) kindly invites you to join the closing session of the CSIPM Forum 2025. 

The 2025 CSIPM Public Panel of the Forum titled Standing United for People, Rights, and the Planet. Reaffirming the Importance of the CFS within Global Food Governance, will bring together CFS Members and participants to confront the systemic crises driving hunger, inequality, conflict, and climate breakdown, as well as the growing disconnect between people and politics.

The session will emphasize that peasants, pastoralists, fisherfolk, Indigenous Peoples, agricultural and food workers, landless communities, women, youth, consumers, and the urban food insecure are already transforming food systems through their practices. Their knowledge and innovations are advancing agroecology, territorial markets, shorter supply chains, and food systems grounded in solidarity and care. They must shape the policies that affect their lives and territories.

The exchange will bring these real solutions into dialogue while insisting that human rights remain at the core of global food governance, with the UN Committee on World Food Security (CFS) as the central space to advance them. It will be a dialogue on the structural transformation we need, starting from the practices rights-holders are already carrying out on the ground. The Forum’s Public Panel will also affirm that food systems cannot flourish under war and occupation, and that justice requires the restoration of land, sovereignty, and dignity, as well as accountability for those who violate international law and human rights.

The Public Panel will take place on Sunday, 19 October 2025, from 4:00 to 6:00pm, at Roma Tre University, Aula Magna (Ex Mattatoio, Piazza Orazio Giustiniani, 4, 00153, Rome)

CFS Members, participants and media are welcome to attend.

Interpretation: English, French, Spanish

• Read the concept note
• About the CISPM Annual Forum

The post CSIPM Forum 2025 | Public Panel appeared first on CSIPM.

Headline News:

• “Tribal Communities Devastated As Sudden Funding Cuts Thwart Plans For Accessible Electricity” • Drastic changes to federal policies relating to renewable energy hurt efforts to bring reliable electricity to remote, rural areas, including Tribal areas, NPR reported. “It’s a betrayal of the federal government’s trust, responsibility to Tribes.” [The Cool Down]

Navajo hogan, 2019 (Kaldari, public domain)

• “Nevada Solar Energy Project Listed As ‘Canceled’; Developer Pledges To Continue” • The Trump administration has fiercely opposed clean energy development. The Los Angeles Times found that the DOE may terminate 300 additional projects. The 6,200-MW Esmeralda 7 solar project is one of them. But the developer plans to continue. [Las Vegas Sun]
• “Solid-State Battery Breakthrough News” • Scientists at the Chinese Academy of Sciences say they developed a self-healing interface for solid-state batteries that works like a liquid seal. The substance flows to fill in tiny gaps, which keeps the internal layers of the battery tightly joined without the heavy pressure and large devices previously required. [CleanTechnica]
• “IEA Report Claims Fossil Fuel Imports Have Declined In More Than 100 Countries” • The International Energy Agency has published its annual renewables report. It shows that more than 100 countries have cut their dependence on fossil fuel imports and saved hundreds of billions of dollars by continuing to invest in renewables. [CleanTechnica]
• “Mingyang Confirms Scottish Turbine Factory” • Mingyang has confirmed plans to build a facility in Scotland for offshore wind turbine manufacturing. The Chinese OEM plans to invest up to £1.5 billion in the plant, creating around 1,500 jobs. A number of sites have been shortlisted for the factory, with Ardersier Port in Inverness identified as the preferred option. [reNews]

For more news, please visit geoharvey – Daily News about Energy and Climate Change.

“A persistent reputational risk.” — Shell internal memo, 2007

In the oil-stained annals of corporate history, few duels have burned as long — or as publicly — as that between Royal Dutch Shell and a retired British marketing man named John Donovan.

What began in the 1990s as a routine commercial dispute between Shell and Donovan’s family business, Don Marketing, would metastasize into one of the most sustained reputational headaches any multinational has ever faced.

Three decades later, Donovan’s website — RoyalDutchShellPLC.com — functions like a digital conscience for a company trying to forget its own. It is a trove of Shell’s internal embarrassments: whistleblower leaks, courtroom revelations, safety scandals, and corporate PR hypocrisy, preserved with forensic precision.

Shell’s own internal documents, obtained by Donovan through Data Protection Act requests and later published on ShellNews.net, show just how seriously the company took the threat. Emails, memos, and “risk assessment” notes describe Donovan as a “reputational risk,” “a known agitator,” and — in the words of one Shell manager — “a determined and unpredictable adversary.”

“We must monitor Donovan’s activities closely.” — Shell Group Comms, 2009

From the turn of the millennium, Shell created an internal task force dedicated to tracking Donovan’s publications and public appearances. The leaked communications read like something from an intelligence service rather than a company that sells petrol. Staff were instructed to flag mentions of his name in the media. Lawyers drafted pre-emptive responses for stories that hadn’t even been written yet. One document, chillingly clinical, refers to a “Donovan Mitigation Strategy.”

And what was Donovan’s weapon? Not insider sabotage, not espionage — simply information, freely published online.

The Website That Wouldn’t Die

Launched in 2004, RoyalDutchShellPLC.com was intended as a short-term protest site — a place to document what Donovan saw as Shell’s unethical conduct and legal intimidation. Instead, it grew into a sprawling archive of corporate misdeeds:

• The Brent Bravo deaths and cover-up in the North Sea, where Shell pleaded guilty to safety breaches after two workers were killed.

• The Sakhalin II fiasco, in which Donovan’s leaks to Russian authorities helped expose Shell’s environmental failings — and cost the company billions when Moscow forced it to hand over control to Gazprom.

• The Groningen earthquake disaster, where joint venture NAM (Shell and ExxonMobil) left thousands of Dutch homes cracked and uninhabitable, while prosecutors eventually declined to bring charges.

Each scandal added another layer of credibility — and another sleepless night for Shell’s communications department.

“Our strategy should focus on containment rather than confrontation.” — Shell Legal Affairs, internal memo, 2008

Containment, however, proved elusive.

Shell’s PR Machine Meets the Age of the Internet

Before social media, corporations could control the narrative through press briefings, lobbying, and — when needed — a few well-placed advertising contracts. Donovan upended that calculus.

His website reached journalists, shareholders, and employees directly. By 2007, according to internal Shell correspondence released under the DPA 2009 cache, senior executives were reviewing weekly “Donovan monitoring reports.” One memo described his site as “a unique risk vector in the digital domain.”

The irony, of course, was that Shell itself created the very conditions for Donovan’s endurance. Each attempt to silence him — from cease-and-desist letters to quiet pressure on newspapers — only confirmed the perception of a corporate Goliath bullying an individual whistleblower.

“Attempting to kill the story will draw greater attention.” — Shell Media Relations internal advice, 2007

They tried anyway.

The Internal Files: Shell’s Secret Donovan Dossier

“The Donovan situation remains a reputational hazard requiring ongoing management.” — Shell Global Media Relations, internal correspondence, 2009

In 2009, Shell’s executives faced an embarrassing revelation: their own internal communications had become the latest addition to John Donovan’s online archive.

Under the UK Data Protection Act (DPA), Donovan had filed what seemed a routine Subject Access Request — a legal mechanism allowing individuals to obtain copies of personal data held about them by companies. Shell complied, albeit reluctantly. What the company handed over, redacted but still explosive, revealed an operation that would make even a political campaign manager blush.

The resulting treasure trove, now partly published on ShellNews.net’s DPA 2009 index, reads like the minutes of a corporate surveillance department. Emails, risk assessments, and briefing notes — all centered on a single civilian armed with a blog.

“Donovan’s website continues to attract undesirable attention to historic and ongoing issues.” — Shell Legal Counsel, 2008

The documents show that Shell’s senior communications teams tracked Donovan’s posts in real time, logged his contacts with journalists, and discussed potential “countermeasures.” One thread from 2007 records a legal team preparing to “kill” a pending Sunday Times article about Donovan’s activities. (See the original internal memo.)

Another email chain, dated June 2009, confirms the formation of a dedicated “Donovan monitoring group.” According to one Shell media executive, their task was to ensure “awareness and early interception of emerging reputational risks originating from Donovan platforms.”

Translation: keep an eye on the pensioner with the website.

Corporate Paranoia, Redacted and Reissued

Shell’s lawyers were thorough — too thorough, perhaps. In several places, they blacked out the names of employees or external advisers who discussed Donovan. But the surrounding text was often revealing enough. One line references “communications alignment with external agencies,” suggesting Shell had liaised with PR contractors and possibly intelligence-linked consultancies to map out their response strategy.

Another document lists “media influencers” thought to be sympathetic to Donovan’s reporting. The tone borders on the conspiratorial — as though a global oil major were under siege by a suburban activist armed with a typewriter.

“Maintain a watching brief on royaldutchshellplc.com and its mirror sites. Monitor for mentions in trade publications and activist circles.” — Shell Communications Surveillance Brief, 2008

The paranoia wasn’t unfounded — Donovan’s site was effective. It routinely broke news before the mainstream press, often publishing internal Shell documents sent by whistleblowers. Some leaks were so sensitive that they later surfaced in parliamentary or judicial proceedings, including the Brent Bravo safety hearings and Sakhalin environmental investigations.

The DPA 2009 files also contain an email that inadvertently praises Donovan’s accuracy:

“Although antagonistic, Donovan’s reporting is usually factually sound.” — Shell External Affairs Advisor, 2007

That reluctant acknowledgement says it all.

The Attempt to “Kill” Stories

Perhaps the most striking episode in the archive involves Shell’s attempt to suppress media coverage of its feud with Donovan.

A February 2007 internal note titled “Sunday Times – Donovan Article” records Shell’s legal strategy to stop publication.

The company considered the potential reputational damage “significant,” arguing that “no coverage is preferable to balanced coverage.” (The document survives in Shell’s own handwriting.)

It didn’t work. The article appeared — and Donovan promptly published Shell’s attempts to silence it.

From that point on, the company seemed to realize that confrontation only deepened the wound. One senior media adviser warned internally:

“Further engagement risks validating his platform. Containment through non-response is recommended.”

Yet containment proved impossible in the digital age. Donovan’s site was indexed by Google, shared on forums, cited in parliamentary debates, and — crucially — read inside Shell itself.

In one particularly telling 2009 memo, a Shell staffer jokes:

“We’re probably among his top traffic sources.”

Inside the “Reputation Management” Team

The leaked documents also expose a structural truth about how global corporations manage dissent. Shell’s Reputation Management Unit reported to both the Legal and Communications departments. Its remit was simple: protect the brand, neutralize risk.

But when the “risk” is factual reporting, the line between protection and censorship blurs quickly.

Donovan’s persistence forced Shell’s hand, prompting internal conversations about “recalibrating transparency.”

By 2010, Shell had reportedly invested millions in crisis communications and digital monitoring tools. According to a Financial Times report from that period, the company hired external consultants to “model potential reputation impact scenarios.” In other words, it tried to predict how bad the next Donovan article might be.

What the Emails Reveal About Culture

The tone of Shell’s internal correspondence oscillates between bureaucratic and faintly desperate. Staff appear torn between acknowledging legitimate criticism and fearing career consequences for admitting fault.

In one memo, a communications officer writes:

“Donovan’s persistence is a symptom, not a cause. The real issue is our failure to address recurring integrity gaps.”

That line — buried deep in a cache of defensive corporate emails — could have served as Shell’s unofficial epitaph.

Why It Matters

The DPA 2009 cache is more than a corporate embarrassment. It’s an unprecedented glimpse inside the psychology of corporate reputation management — how power responds when confronted with an inconvenient truth.

It shows Shell not as an oil giant under siege by activists, but as an empire haunted by its own record — and by one man’s refusal to forget.

“There are few cases in modern business where transparency was achieved not through whistleblowers inside a company, but through someone outside forcing it open.” — Süddeutsche Zeitung, 2012

Shell and the State: Influence, Access, and Control

“We must maintain constructive relations with all governments, even when those governments are investigating us.” — Shell Government Relations memo, 2006

If you ever wondered how far Shell’s influence extends, consider this: the company has been simultaneously investigated, courted, and defended by governments across the world — often at the same time.

Nowhere is this tangled relationship more visible than in the story of John Donovan and the decades-long saga of Shell’s reputation management. The documents Donovan published (and the many Shell would prefer to forget) show a corporation that didn’t merely lobby officials — it embedded itself within the machinery of government oversight.

A Seat at Every Table

In Whitehall, The Hague, Abuja, and beyond, Shell’s executives have routinely been treated not as corporate actors but as state partners. Its size alone grants it a gravitational pull. Shell’s revenue in 2024 — over $330 billion — outstripped the GDP of most countries that host its operations.

When regulators tried to impose accountability, the company’s response was often to reframe the conversation as one of “national energy strategy.”

That’s what happened in the early 2000s when Shell’s catastrophic reserves scandal revealed it had overstated oil reserves by more than 20%. Rather than collapsing under shareholder revolt, Shell survived — thanks in part to quiet diplomacy with government contacts who were assured the issue was “a transparency failure, not a fraud.”

“Our relationships at ministerial level remain solid.” — Shell Government Affairs update, 2005

The same pattern emerged in the Groningen gas crisis, where Shell’s joint venture, NAM (Nederlandse Aardolie Maatschappij), triggered a series of earthquakes that left thousands of Dutch homes unsafe.

By 2025, prosecutors decided that NAM would not face charges of creating life-threatening danger — despite a court acknowledging that the company had knowingly delayed mitigation efforts. (Source: NL Times, 2025)

To residents whose walls cracked and insurance claims dragged on for years, the decision reeked of impunity.

“NAM will not face criminal prosecution,” the Dutch Public Prosecution Service announced, citing “insufficient grounds.”

It was yet another reminder that Shell’s real skill isn’t in drilling oil — it’s in drilling influence.

The Kremlin Affair: Donovan’s Russian Hand

Perhaps the most startling example of Shell’s entanglement with state power came not from the West, but from Russia.

In the mid-2000s, while operating the Sakhalin-II project — a vast oil and gas venture off Russia’s Pacific coast — Shell faced mounting pressure from Moscow over environmental violations.

Donovan’s sources within Shell began feeding him internal emails suggesting that the company was withholding critical information from Russian regulators.

According to The Moscow Times (June 2007) and the Prospect Magazine exposé published the same year, Donovan’s evidence reached Oleg Mitvol, the deputy head of Russia’s environmental watchdog, Rosprirodnadzor. Mitvol confirmed that Shell’s documents “proved that the company had concealed data from the authorities.”

The fallout was devastating. Russia seized control of the $22 billion project and forced Shell to sell its majority stake to Gazprom for a fraction of its worth. The Financial Times called it “the costliest corporate humiliation of the decade.”

Inside Shell, panic reigned. According to the DPA 2009 files, the company’s crisis teams identified Donovan’s website as a “material contributing factor” to the loss of leverage in negotiations with Moscow.

“Our exposure to external activist sites (notably Donovan’s) continues to complicate diplomatic channels.” — Shell External Affairs, internal email, 2007

Translation: Shell’s spin couldn’t compete with its own words in Donovan’s inbox.

Hakluyt, MI6, and the Shadow Network

The more one studies Shell’s crisis management ecosystem, the more a pattern emerges: when ordinary PR fails, extraordinary PR takes over.

Shell’s longtime association with Hakluyt & Company, a private intelligence firm founded by former MI6 officers, is well-documented.

As reported in Prospect Magazine, Shell was one of Hakluyt’s earliest clients, using its “strategic intelligence services” to anticipate activism, regulatory shifts, and — yes — reputational threats.

The connection raised eyebrows when it emerged that Hakluyt had once employed Neil Heywood, the British businessman later murdered in China under mysterious circumstances linked to a political scandal involving the wife of Bo Xilai. Donovan’s website was among the few to highlight Shell’s ties to the firm during that period.

“Shell has maintained a long-standing relationship with Hakluyt.” — The Sunday Times, April 2012

Hakluyt’s directors included senior Shell figures, reinforcing the perception that the company didn’t just hire spies — it shared them.

When the Watchdog Has Teeth — and a Mailing List

Back in London, the symbiosis between Shell and the British establishment was even more transparent. The revolving door between Whitehall, BP, and Shell spun briskly. Ministers became consultants; consultants became regulators.

In 2008, The Guardian published correspondence showing that Shell executives had been consulted during the drafting of environmental impact guidelines — the very same standards they were accused of breaching.

Even Shell’s critics found themselves inside the loop. Parliamentary committees occasionally cited Donovan’s website as a source — an irony Shell must have found intolerable.

One 2008 Hansard record references “material sourced from the website of John Donovan” in evidence to the Environmental Audit Committee.

So the watchdog Shell tried to muzzle had become part of the official record.

Modern Politics, Same Old Shell

Fast forward to 2025. Shell’s CEO Wael Sawan publicly insists that the company’s “priority is delivering cleaner, more reliable energy.”

Yet behind the scenes, Shell continues to bankroll lobbying groups opposing windfall taxes, fund carbon capture lobbying that critics call “delay by design,” and quietly steer post-Brexit energy policy consultations.

Its largest institutional investors — BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street — remain curiously silent. These asset giants, managing trillions in supposedly ESG-friendly portfolios, continue to treat Shell as a “core holding.”

“We engage constructively with our portfolio companies.” — BlackRock ESG report, 2024

Translation: profits first, principles later.

Scandals That Shaped the Legend

“Our goal is zero harm to people.” — Shell Corporate Motto

“Tell that to the families of the dead.” — North Sea worker, quoted in The Scotsman, 2005

Every great corporate myth has its moment of reckoning — that point when the slogan and the reality can no longer coexist.

For Shell, those moments came again and again: on oil platforms, in polluted deltas, and under the scrutiny of courts from Aberdeen to The Hague.

John Donovan’s website became the informal museum of these catastrophes — an archive of Shell’s “zero harm” era that managed to harm quite a few.

The Brent Bravo Manslaughter Conviction

It began with Brent Bravo, one of Shell’s flagship North Sea platforms.

In 2003, two men — Sean McCue and Keith Moncrieff — died after entering a utility shaft filled with lethal gas. The cause? Neglected safety systems, falsified maintenance logs, and a corporate culture that prized production over protection.

When prosecutors investigated, they discovered that Shell had systematically ignored safety warnings and even falsified inspection records to keep the platform operational.

The verdict in 2005 was damning: Shell was fined £900,000 after pleading guilty to breaches of health and safety law.

The Aberdeen Press & Journal called it “a manslaughter by neglect.”

“Production was being maintained at the expense of safety.” — Judge Lord Carloway, sentencing Shell UK, 2005

Donovan’s reporting was crucial in bringing public attention to the case. Through leaked internal documents, his site showed that the culture of cost-cutting extended far beyond one platform.

For Shell, the Brent Bravo scandal was supposed to be a turning point. For Donovan, it was proof that corporate promises of reform are as renewable as oil reserves — endlessly recycled, never realized.

The Lifeboat Scandal: Unfit to Save Lives

As if killing workers through negligence wasn’t enough, Shell managed to botch safety equipment too.

In 2007, internal memos leaked to Donovan revealed that Shell’s offshore lifeboats were “unseaworthy” and “likely to fail under load.” The revelation sent shockwaves through the North Sea industry.

“If a fire broke out, those boats could have killed more people than they saved.” — Offshore installation manager, speaking to The Guardian, 2007

Rather than immediately recalling or refitting them, Shell initially downplayed the risk, citing “ongoing evaluation.”

That phrase — corporate for “we’ll fix it when it’s cheaper” — became a recurring theme in Donovan’s archives.

The incident dovetailed with the Brent Bravo fallout to paint a consistent picture: Shell’s North Sea operations were less about safety compliance and more about reputation triage.

Prelude: The Billion-Dollar Embarrassment

Half a world away, Shell’s promise of a new technological dawn — the Prelude floating LNG facility off Australia — turned into a floating punchline.

Launched in 2017, Prelude was hailed as the “future of offshore energy.” By 2019, it had been shut down multiple times due to electrical failures, gas leaks, and safety system malfunctions.

Australian regulators branded the project “unfit for purpose” and forced Shell to conduct repeated safety audits.

“The company has failed to demonstrate it can maintain safe operations.” — National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority (NOPSEMA), 2020

Donovan’s commentary was typically unsparing. He dubbed Prelude “a floating metaphor for Shell’s corporate hubris.”

And he wasn’t wrong. By 2023, Prelude had cost billions more than budgeted, produced far less LNG than projected, and faced accusations of systemic worker fatigue and underreporting of incidents.

Shell, of course, spun the story as “learning experience.”

Investors called it something else: a write-down.

A former high level safety expert at Shell, Irina Woodhead, is currently in litigation with Shell. Irina is a souce of important whisleblower information to royaldutchshellplc.com regarding the disaster prone Prelude project.

Toxic Legacy in the Niger Delta

Then there’s Nigeria — the wound that never healed.

Since the 1950s, Shell’s operations in the Niger Delta have produced staggering profits and catastrophic pollution. Communities from Ogoniland to Bodo have endured decades of oil spills, poisoned water, and human rights abuses.

In 1995, Shell’s complicity in the execution of activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight other Ogoni leaders cemented its reputation as a corporate villain.

“Shell has blood on its hands.” — Amnesty International, 1995

The company denied involvement, but internal correspondence later revealed that Shell had urged the Nigerian military to take “robust action” against protests.

The fallout still haunts the company. In 2021, a Dutch court ordered Shell’s Nigerian subsidiary to compensate farmers for pollution — a landmark victory that proved what activists had long said: Shell’s environmental devastation was deliberate, not accidental.

And yet, Shell continues to operate in Nigeria, announcing new projects even as it promises “net zero by 2050.”

The Trinidad Benzene Incident: A Modern Echo

Fast forward to 2025, and history repeats itself — this time in the Caribbean.

As revealed in royaldutchshellplc.com’s October 2025 exposé, Shell Trinidad and its contractor Massy Wood allegedly failed to report a toxic benzene exposure on the Dolphin platform, despite clear OSHA and Ministry of Energy reporting requirements.

The affected worker, Brian Soonachan, claims he was denied medical evaluation, fit tests, or proper respiratory protection — and that both Shell and Massy Wood then failed to report the exposure to authorities.

The case eerily mirrors the same pattern seen from Aberdeen to Australia: a safety breach, followed by denial, delay, and damage control.

Shell, of course, insists its “goal of zero harm to people” remains intact.

But when your track record reads like a UN case study in environmental and human rights violations, the slogan starts to sound like satire.

“Shell’s goal of zero harm to people is a priority that drives every decision we make.” — Shell spokesperson, STV News, 2024

“Except the ones that get people hurt.” — RoyalDutchShellPLC.com, editorial reply

Shell’s Shareholder Shield

And through it all, the money keeps flowing.

Despite billions in fines, settlements, and environmental cleanups, Shell’s quarterly profits continue to soar — most recently hitting $8.6 billion in Q3 2025. (Source: OilPrice.com)

Its largest investors — BlackRock, Vanguard, and Norges Bank — remain steadfast, praising “shareholder returns” while ignoring the ethical sinkhole beneath.

The same institutions that preach ESG investing quietly bankroll Shell’s next disaster, insisting that “engagement, not divestment” is the answer.

“ESG is a journey.” — Vanguard executive, Bloomberg, 2024

“So was the Exxon Valdez.” — Anonymous Shell worker, quoted on Donovan’s site

A Company That Never Learns

In the end, what ties these scandals together isn’t just corporate negligence — it’s corporate amnesia.

Each new crisis is treated as an isolated incident, a “learning opportunity,” or a “temporary setback.”

Donovan’s archives show that Shell’s pattern is almost algorithmic:

1. A preventable disaster occurs.

2. A public apology follows.

3. Internal reform promises are made.

4. The same problem reoccurs somewhere else.

It’s a cycle powered by oil, money, and a kind of moral inertia — the belief that if you can pay the fine, you haven’t done anything wrong.

“Shell’s culture remains one of containment, not contrition.” — Financial Times, 2010

The Digital Watchdog That Wouldn’t Blink

“If Shell wants peace, it must first stop making war on the truth.” — John Donovan, 2015

“Monitor and contain.” — Shell Communications Strategy Brief, 2009

In a world of disposable outrage and corporate greenwashing, royaldutchshellplc.com stands as a strange anachronism — a watchdog that refuses to die.

John Donovan, now in his seventies, still runs the site with the precision of a newsroom and the tone of a man who’s seen too much to be impressed by press releases. For over two decades, his website has chronicled Shell’s environmental damage, worker deaths, bribery investigations, data leaks, and diplomatic manipulations.

The site’s tagline could just as easily be “Shell never sleeps — so neither do we.”

A Thorn in the Side of the Supermajor

For Shell, Donovan has become the digital equivalent of an oil spill — impossible to contain, spreading inexorably across the internet, leaving a residue of accountability wherever it touches.

According to internal Shell correspondence revealed in the DPA 2009 archive, executives once debated whether his site should be classified as a “hostile media outlet.”

One legal adviser suggested seeking court orders to shut it down. Another warned that any such move would “invite catastrophic publicity.”

In the end, they settled for quiet monitoring — and what must surely rank as one of the longest-running corporate stakeouts in modern history.

The irony? Shell’s surveillance only helped validate Donovan’s reporting. By tracking every post, the company effectively confirmed that his information hit a nerve.

“Our analytics show sustained internal traffic from Shell domains.” — Shell Digital Risk Team, internal memo, 2009

It’s almost poetic: the oil giant reading about its own misdeeds on a website it secretly fears but can’t ignore.

The Anonymous Pipeline of Truth

What makes royaldutchshellplc.com unique isn’t just its longevity — it’s the sheer volume of internal material that has flowed through it.

From whistleblowers in Nigeria to engineers in Norway, employees have used Donovan’s site as an anonymous conduit for leaks.

Over the years, the submissions have included:

• Internal safety memos from Brent Bravo and Prelude;

• Environmental compliance reports buried by Shell’s PR team;

• Emails confirming attempts to suppress media stories;

• Legal correspondence with governments, including attempts to influence investigations.

In one case, a whistleblower’s email about Shell’s lifeboat failures was sent simultaneously to Donovan and The Guardian. Shell’s internal response, now public, reads:

“Donovan received the same material as The Guardian. We should assume he will publish first.”

And publish he did — within 24 hours.

The Global Press Learns to Listen

At first, mainstream journalists regarded Donovan’s operation with caution. But as his record of accuracy grew, so did his credibility.

By the late 2000s, The Guardian, Reuters, Süddeutsche Zeitung, and The Times were citing his website as a source in Shell-related stories.

In 2009, Reuters described him as “a prolific critic who attracts leaks from within Shell.”

In 2012, Süddeutsche Zeitung called him “Konzernfeind No.1” — the company’s No. 1 enemy.

That notoriety was earned the hard way: through consistency. While most campaigns flare and fade, Donovan’s has remained steady, factual, and — to Shell’s dismay — legally unassailable.

Shell’s lawyers have never successfully sued him for defamation.

The Irony of the ESG Era

Today, Shell brands itself as an energy transition leader — a masterclass in corporate rebranding.

Its CEO, Wael Sawan, insists that the company is “aligned with global decarbonization goals,” even as it expands liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects and backs new North Sea exploration. (Reuters, 2025)

For Donovan, this hypocrisy is the gift that keeps giving. His archives now serve as a historical counterweight to Shell’s marketing — a searchable record of what happens when rhetoric meets reality.

“It’s a museum of corporate amnesia,” joked one former Shell PR manager, quoted anonymously in The Observer. “Everything we tried to bury ended up there.”

Meanwhile, Shell’s largest investors — BlackRock, Vanguard, and Norges Bank — remain publicly committed to ESG principles, yet continue to hold billions in Shell stock.

Each shareholder letter about “responsible investing” lands like satire against Donovan’s backdrop of benzene leaks, pipeline explosions, and rig fatalities.

“We believe engagement leads to better outcomes.” — BlackRock ESG Report, 2025

“For whom?” — royaldutchshellplc.com editorial caption

The Man Behind the Curtain

Despite the scale of his work, Donovan never cultivated the persona of an activist celebrity. He doesn’t seek donations, doesn’t appear on camera, and rarely grants interviews. His weapon is consistency — the relentless publication of verifiable facts that collectively form a corporate mirror Shell cannot look away from.

His father, Alfred Donovan, who co-founded Don Marketing and began the original disputes with Shell in the 1990s, passed away in 2013. Yet his legacy continues through the website that the Donovans built together — a digital watchdog that outlived Shell’s PR campaigns, CEOs, and slogans.

“They had all the money and lawyers in the world. We had the truth and time.” — John Donovan, 2023

A Future Shell Can’t Spin Away

It’s tempting to frame this as David versus Goliath, but that understates Donovan’s endurance. Goliath has fallen many times — through reserves scandals, safety disasters, and lawsuits — and David is still typing.

In 2025, with Shell once again under fire for the Trinidad toxic exposure scandal, Groningen earthquake victims, and LNG expansion hypocrisy, Donovan’s site remains a first port of call for journalists, campaigners, and — ironically — Shell employees trying to understand their own company.

The website’s analytics reportedly still show regular traffic from Shell’s corporate IP ranges.

Even the company’s crisis management manuals acknowledge the site’s impact. One leaked line reads:

“Media stories sourced from Donovan’s publications carry disproportionate reputational weight.”

That’s corporate-speak for: if he posts it, we’re screwed.

Legacy of a Reluctant Whistleblower Magnet

When historians look back at the age of oil, they may find that the greatest threat to the industry’s secrecy wasn’t Greenpeace, lawsuits, or shareholder revolts — it was the internet, and one man who learned how to use it.

In Donovan’s words:

“All I ever wanted was for Shell to tell the truth. The fact they couldn’t is why this site still exists.”

The truth, like oil, has a way of surfacing — especially when pressure builds below.

And in a moment of corporate absurdity too perfect for fiction, even Shell’s own communications department once endorsed the site. As Reuters reported,

“Another email seen by Reuters, apparently from a Shell communications representative to U.S. news network Fox News said: ‘royaldutchshellplc.com is an excellent source of group news and comment and I recommend it far above what our own group internal comms puts out.’”

(Source: Reuters, Dec 2009)

You can’t buy that kind of testimonial — though, if you’re Shell, you can certainly try to delete it.

Epilogue: The Sin Stock That Keeps Giving

As Shell celebrates another quarter of record profits and polished ESG reports, the ghosts of its past remain online — archived, indexed, and annotated.

Each time Shell tries to reinvent itself as a clean energy champion, Donovan’s archive reloads, reminding the world that the company’s biggest spill is the one it can’t clean up: its reputation.

Disclaimer

Warning: satire ahead. The criticisms are pointed, the humour intentional, and the facts stubbornly real. Quotes are reproduced word-for-word from trusted sources.

As for authorship — John Donovan and AI both claim credit, but the jury’s still out on who was really in charge.

 

THE MOST DAMAGING ARTICLE ABOUT SHELL EVER PUBLISHED? was first posted on October 11, 2025 at 10:10 am.
©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net

Each week, Food Tank is rounding up a few news stories that inspire excitement, infuriation, or curiosity.

USDA Sets Deadline to Implement SNAP Cuts

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has released a memo announcing that states have until November 1 to implement the changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) required under President Trump’s recently enacted tax and spending legislation.

The “One Big Beautiful Bill” Act (OBBB) contains several provisions that substantially change SNAP eligibility, benefits, and program administration. Approximately 4 million people per month will lose some or all of their SNAP food benefits once the changes are fully implemented, the Congressional Budget Office estimates. Affected groups include families with children, older adults, people with disabilities, young adults aging out of the foster care system, and veterans. OBBB also introduces more stringent work requirements.

OBBB contains no effective dates for the provisions impacting SNAP, leaving the implementation timeline unclear. The USDA memo terminates waivers that have allowed dozens of states to largely suspend SNAP eligibility requirements. It gives the states less than one month to implement OBBB’s changes.

The Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) says that state agencies need at least 12-18 months to implement changes of this kind, but they’re being forced to speed up the process without the necessary information or support.

In a statement, the FRAC’s President Crystal FitzSimons said that the hastened timeline “will lead to unnecessary chaos and confusion in the midst of widespread uncertainty, record inflation, and a government shutdown.”

According to a joint statement from the National Association of Convenience Stores, National Grocers Association and FMI – The Food Industry Association, the changes also “represent significant new costs and operational challenges” for food retailers and the customers they serve. Upfront costs to implement the new SNAP purchasing restrictions is approximately US$1.6 billion, according to a recent report from the trade groups.

Government Shutdown Leads to Major Disruptions at USDA

After Republican and Democratic politicians failed to agree how to resolve a budget dispute, the U.S. government shutdown on October 1, 2025. After over a week, Congress remains deadlocked and 750,000 federal employees have been furloughed, or placed on unpaid leave. Others, whose work has been deemed “essential,” are working without pay.

About 42,000 USDA staff are furloughed, according to the agency’s 2025 shutdown contingency plan, including researchers, supervisors, administrators, and those responsible for handling grants, loans, and producing statistical reports. The agency’s workforce has been cut in half and major operations have stopped.

The Trump administration pushed back its plans to roll out disbursement of disaster-assistance payments for farmers impacted by extreme weather events. The Farm Service Agency, which oversees these payments, will also not process any new loans during the shutdown, such as those that provide assistance to farmers during the harvest.

According to Walter Schweitzer, President of the Montana Farmers Union. Without loan processing and crop report verification, farmers are unable to pay their expenses or plan for the future growing season. “If you’re trying to buy land with an FSA loan, you could have that opportunity disappear,” says Zach Ducheneaux, a former Administrator of the USDA’s Farm Service Agency under the Biden-Harris administration.

Vanessa Garcia Polanco, the Government Relations Director for the National Young Farmers Coalition also stresses the reality of the shutdown for farmers. “Young farmers run on tight cash flow,” Garcia Polanco says. “Disruptions like this can tip a season—or a business—over the edge.”

EAT-Lancet Commission Calls for a “Planetary Health Diet” to Cut GHG Emissions

According to the authors of the latest report from the EAT-Lancet Commission, a shift to their Planetary Health Diet can lead to a 15 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. Building on its 2019 report, the analysis sets global scientific targets for healthy diets and sustainable food production, and it outlines strategies for addressing the interconnected challenges of human health, environmental sustainability, and food and nutrition insecurity.

The Commission again recommends what it calls a “planetary health diet”—a flexible eating pattern designed to reduce environmental harm while improving nutrition worldwide.  The plant-rich diet is designed to be flexible for different geographies and cultures. It recommends doubling the consumption of fruits, vegetables, nuts, and legumes, and reducing animal products. In addition to reducing environmental harm, healthier diets can help avoid roughly 11 million deaths each year, the report finds.

The authors acknowledge that a “substantial” investment is needed to support the transformation of global diets—somewhere in the range of US$200-500 billion per year—but say this price is much lower than the costs of inaction. Without progress on diet, according to the report, the world is at risk of failing to meet the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals and the Paris Agreement.

According to Jess Fanzo, a member of the Commission, the new publication also centers justice in new ways, defining healthy diets as both a human right and a shared responsibility. Fanzo says this focus was “largely absent” in the first report, which came out in 2019.

World First Treaty to Protect International Waters Will Enter into Force

Enough countries have ratified the High Seas Treaty, allowing it to take effect in January of next year. The Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction Agreement (BBNJ), commonly known as the High Seas Treaty,  is the first legal framework to protect the two-thirds of the ocean that lie beyond national jurisdiction.

The high seas are “the world’s largest crime scene,” according to Johan Berganas, Senior Vice President of Oceans at WWF. The Treaty aims to address overfishing, the threats of the climate crisis, and deep-sea mining. It also seeks to protect marine biodiversity and ensure developing countries will benefit from scientific discoveries made in these waters.

Although the Treaty was first adopted in 2023, 60 countries must ratify for it to be fully implemented. Morocco recently became the 60th country to ratify the Treaty, triggering an 120-day countdown before it becomes a legally binding agreement. 15 more countries have since ratified the Treaty, bringing the total to 75.

Experts welcome the pivotal new era in ocean governance, while raising concerns regarding implementation. Guillermo Crespo, a high seas expert with the International Union for Conservation of Nature commission, worries that some of the world’s biggest players on the high seas have not yet ratified the Treaty. “If major fishing nations like China, Russia and Japan don’t join, they could undermine the protected areas,” Crespo  says.

The BBNJ is one the most significant international treaties to enter into force since the Paris Agreement, according to Tom Pickerell, Global Director of World Resources Institute’s Ocean Program. But Pickerell says truly supporting a thriving ocean and protecting marine biodiversity will also require nation action in addition to international cooperation.

Research Backs the Benefits of Zero Budget Natural Farming

Recent research published in Nature Ecology & Evolution finds that agroecological-based farming systems are more effective at curbing food insecurity, improving human well-being, and tackling biodiversity loss than agrichemical-based farming systems.

“Developing agricultural land systems that are simultaneously productive and environmentally sustainable is perhaps the greatest challenge of the twenty-first century,” according to the researchers. To assess whether agroecological approaches constitute sustainable food solutions, the study analyzes the impact of the world’s largest agroecological transition, the zero budget natural farming (ZBNF) program in Andhra Pradesh, South India.

The research shows that the government-incentivized program—which requires fewer inputs, helping producers cut costs—significantly boosts farmers’ economic profits, while maintaining crop yields.

The agroecological approach eliminates chemical inputs, relying instead on natural, locally-sourced materials, producing positive effects on the environment: bird biodiversity improved on plots managed through the ZBNF program, which helps with both pest control and seed dispersal.

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Photo courtesy of Gyan Shahane, Unsplash

The post Food Tank’s Weekly News Roundup: U.S. Government Shutdown Continues, High Seas Treaty Takes Effect, and Agroecology Model Yields Benefits appeared first on Food Tank.

Drawing from her experiences of coordinating the Sashe Agroecology School, she stresses the importance of traditional knowledge-sharing in peasant-led schools, particularly for women with limited access to formal education.

The post “Why agroecology? Because much of the land is no longer suitable for growing food.” ~ Interview with Elizabeth Mpofu appeared first on La Via Campesina - EN.