In the Bauges massif, in Savoie, a baker makes her bread rise with a large mirror installed outside. Here, the sun actually serves as the main fuel.
Upon leaving her CAP, Violaine Jaccoud refused traditional solutions. She explains it straightforwardly: , she confides to France 3 Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes.
In Savoie, a solar bakery in permanent experimentation
Seduced, the baker then joined forces with the Low-tech Lab, which helped her set up and document this prototype. She loves this pioneering role:
Parabolic mirrors concentrate the sun’s rays into the cooking chamber, up to around 500 degrees. For Violaine Jaccoud, this choice goes beyond simple technique:
Solar oven, capricious weather and production limits
This free energy, however, remains dependent on the Savoyard sky. In 2024, the weather has slowed down the oven, to the point of limiting batches of bread:
To guarantee daily bread, Violaine Jaccoud therefore added a small wood-fired oven from the second year. Solar remains reserved for brioches, biscuits and lighter batches.
Towards a solar bakery sector in France
In Normandy, the NeoLoco structure has been experimenting since 2017 with a professional solar bakery with a Lytefire type concentrator, developed in 2011. The installation can bake several dozen kilos of bread per day when the sunshine is favorable, without consuming electricity.
In Nantes, the Facettes bakery is set up in a tiny house of 40 m², with a wood oven and a solar oven of around 5 m² of mirrors. In the context of the 2022-2023 energy crisis, these models show that a bread oven, which can consume nearly 74,300 kWh per year, is not condemned to all-electric operation.
What is a solar bakery?
It is a bakery that bakes part of its production in the sun.
How does Violaine Jaccoud’s solar oven work?
Its oven concentrates the rays using exterior parabolic mirrors.
Can a solar bakery bake all its bread in the sun?
In the Bauges, a small wood-fired oven remains essential in winter.
