Brilliant Newfoundlander Invents the Solution!

Building a Parabolic Solar Hot-Water Heater using 123D My first step was to do a calculation to figure out if my idea was crazy. I started with my goal: Make the solar equivalent of the hot-water tap on a coffee machine. How much power do I need? Lets say I want to fill up my mug with hot water in about 15 seconds. How big of a mirror is that? In most places, on a clear sunny day, there's about .8 kilowatts of sunlight per square meter. That was a lot bigger than I could make, but it gave me an idea of scale.