Every year over the last decade and more, I've bought trees ($60) and bees ($30) from Heifer International. Usually, I pick the project and designate where I want them to go. Last year, I realized that all those trees I've donated are my own personal carbon offset program. This year, through Neil Gaiman's blog, I learned that Patrick Rothfuss is doubling contributions through his blog until the end of December 11 (today!). There's a lottery for contributors of some great science fiction books and things as well.
Last year, I found some other great solar Christmas gifts as well.
As a Christmas gift, you can donate solar ovens to people in the refugee camps around Darfur. For the people there, who are at risk every time they have to leave the camp to seek scarce fuel, a solar oven can mean survival.
Jewish World Watch sends two solar ovens to the Iridimi and Touloum refugee camps in Chad for $30.
There are other solar oven programs as well.
This video from German CARE is especially close to my heart because it shows a woman in one of the 3 international displaced person camps they run in Easten Chad using a solar oven and a "haybox" or retained heat cooker to prepare a meal.
The haybox is simply an insulated box into which you place a hot pot. The heat has nowhere to go but into the food. You can also use a stone as a heat reservoir: heat the stone, place it in the box with a pot of food, cook. It's an old, old technique updated with solar. I love these ancient solutions to common problems.
You can give a solar LED flashlights and AA battery chargers to friends and family. These Bogolights are very well designed with one button (on and off) and one screw to secure the battery bay. There's even a phosphorescent band so you can find the flashlight in the dark. They work as reading lights too. I know because I tried them out. They also use standard AA rechargeable batteries and allow for battery switching, charging one set of batteries while using another set in a second device.
Bogo means "buy one, give one" by which they mean, you spend $39 to buy one for yourself and the company sends a second to somebody in the developing world. You can even choose where and what program. A good deal, even though the price went up over the last year.
Another giftable solar device is Freeplay's Companion solar/dynamo radio, light, and cell phone charger. You can easily modify it so that you can charge AA, C, D, and other dry cell batteries and have a reliable source of low voltage DC power day or night, by sunlight or muscle power. This is the ultimate solar survival tool and, after all,
Solar IS Civil Defense