Paper Title
Perception of The Use of Solar Energy for Cooking By Rural Women in EDO State Nigeria

Abstract
Non renewable energy sources are prone to exhaustion besides its inherent environmental and health hazard. Cooking takes a great share of these non renewable energy sources. In order to promote the use of solar energy which is abundantly available and renewable, the knowledge about it and its use in rural communities in Edo State was examined. The descriptive research design of survey was used for this study. The population consisted of all the women in Edo State. The sample comprises 1800 rural women with 100 selected from each of the 18 local government areas of Edo State. Stratified proportional random sampling was used to select the sample for the study. One self-designed questionnaire, tagged “Perception of the Use of Solar Energy for cooking (PUSEC)” was used to collect the necessary data for the study. Percentage scores were used to analyze the data collected. Research experts in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Federal University of Technology Minna validated the instrument with the aid of test-retest method. It was concluded that deforestation and environmental pollution are very imminent because of the incessant use of firewood for cooking. There is a great lack of knowledge about the use and health benefits of solar cooking. There is a great interest in utilizing solar energy for cooking and the interest is hinged on its affordability and easy to use as painstakingly highlighted by the respondents. It was recommended that the government should sensitize the rural women about the adverse effect and environmental threat associated with the use of non renewable energy sources. The use of solar energy should be promoted and encouraged by subsidizing the cost. Index Terms - Cooking, environmental, health, renewable energy, respondents, solar energy