Activity Description: In partnership with the Hospital San Vicente de Paul, the Universidad Nacional of Costa Rica is introducing a solar oven as an environmentally-sound and cost-effective method of sterilizing hazardous hospital biological waste.

Intended primarily for the benefit of poor and remote communities, the solar oven, guaranteeing the necessary temperatures of 180 to 200 degrees Celsius for sterilization of hospital biological waste, can be located on-site, produces no toxic compounds, and the treated material can be disposed as common biological inert waste.

The solar oven project was a 2005 winner of the Development Marketplace competition.