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Renewable Energy for Kids: Teaching Children About Renewable Energy
Author: Justin R.
A good start would be defining exactly what renewable energy is. You can suggest they make a list of non-renewable and renewable power sources and build from there. Some examples would be:
Non-Renewable: Oil/Gas, Natural Gas, Coal, Nuclear
Renewable: Solar, Wind, Geothermal, Hydro/Water
Explain to them how renewable energy comes from natural forces. It is different from fossil fuels as it does not make greenhouse gases or other pollutants.
You can further explain how the mass production of electricity using renewable energy sources has only recently become more popular. Some of the reasons why it's becoming more popular include: climate change caused by pollution and fossil fuels are all being used up and becoming more expensive.
A great idea is to teach kids about energy efficiency. Have them make a list of all the powered devices they use for a day such as TV, computer, lights, etc. and for how long, and if possible the wattage of each device. If they can't get the wattage, you can look up the average wattage for each device for demostration purposes. Do a rough calcuation to show them how much power they're using in a day.
Now have them do an 'energy conservation' day where they turn off devices when they're not using them, turn off lights when not in a room, turn down the heat/AC a couple degrees, etc. Now recalculate the daily wattage and show them how much energy they saved with a few simple changes.
Another great idea is show them how installing a solar panel or windmill can generate electricy for their own home. It's not as expensive as you might think. You don't need an expensive commerical system. You can build your own for 0-200 dollars and your kids could even help if they're old enough. The less they take energy for granted, the better.
These lessons will stick with them (especially at such an impressionable age) and they'll be using these practices for the rest of their life. Teach renewable energy for kids, the sooner the better!
Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/childhood-education-articles/renewable-energy-for-kids-teaching-children-about-renewable-energy-838863.html
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A meteorologist colleague of mine told me 10 years ago that fossil fuel use contributes a few hundredths of a degree centigrade to global temperatures, it may reinforce natural warming or mitigate natural cooling by some fraction of a degree. Recent publications suggest that man’s contribution to the 0.6C 20th century warming is 10 – 20%, that means 0.06C – 0.12C, so it looks to me that he was spot on.
BritWord is quite wrong about plant growth and CO2 concentration, it is the critical rate limiting factor in photosynthesis. Optimum is 1000ppm and at 200ppm photosynthesis stops all-together. At the present level of 380ppm, we are comfortably above the minimum, but plants are still stressed at this low level – I worked in a laboratory researching the biochemistry of photosynthesis.
Using such energy sources doesn’t actually mitigate the effects of climate change. However they do not contribute to climate change either, because they produce less Carbondioxide than conventional energy sources.
there’s a rather wide range.
unfortunately, there are quite a few that really don’t want to understand.
the problem is that what they want to be true is worth more to them than really understanding.
others are just eternally curious. if that describes you then:
http://dels.nas.edu/dels/rpt_briefs/climate_change_2008_final.pdf < == this is why CO2 is a problem.
http://www.rkm.com.au/ANIMATIONS/carbon-dioxide-global-warming.html < == here's the physics.
http://www.school-for-champions.com/science/infrared_greenhouse_effect.htm < == melting of the Siberian tundra is a global warming time bomb.
http://fora.tv/2009/08/18/A_REALLY_Inconvenient_Truth_Dan_Miller < == This is an hour long, but is very good.
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/326/5960/1646 < == Very long, but excellent.
It has often been claimed that changes in the sun are the problem, and that it's been cooling since 1998.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_variation
Note that from 1997 to 2002, the sun was warming, in contradiction to the argument that it’s been cooling since 1998.
In fact, 1998 was the hottest year on record for quite a while.
More recently, AGW deniers are claiming that it’s been cooling since 2006. That’s because 2005 and 1998 were almost too close to call. The difference is that 1998 was the year of the strongest el nino ever recorded. 2005 was not an el nino year. The “un-natural” CO2 induced warming has caught up with the el nino peak.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/?report=global
Welcome! Are you considering the Philippines in your project?
We are working on projects like yours, particularly the environment and philippine biodiversity and its conservation. Please contact me @yahoo.com
It is a political term to describe power sources that don’t emit much CO2 but which can’t actually provide the power our civilisation needs (so far no country has managed to get much more than 20% of their power from wind or solar and even then they had to rely on their neighbours’ hydro and nuclear as well as their own coal to prevent the grid from collapsing). Hydro is the main renewable energy source for electricity production right now but is opposed by most of the people who claim we need renewable energy (and unlike their opposition to nuclear power they actually have good reasons to oppose hydro).
They are used mainly to delay the switch to nuclear power (which despite being not renewable should be good for millions of years at higher than current energy use) that would allow us to actually solve the global warming problem and thus contribute to global warming by keeping the fossil fuel industry in business.
Basically the way it does that is that a bunch of windmills get built and start supplying power to the grid but because of natural variability in the wind they don’t provide that power all the time (20% of rated capacity is considered pretty good for wind) nor can we control when they provide their power so to use wind power you need a source of backup power that is reliable and usually that means fossil fuels (nuclear could be used but if you use nuclear for that then you may as well not bother with the windmills because the windmills would not reduce CO2 emissions or save money). Solar is less variable but PV cells cost a lot more and it still needs backup at night and partial backup on cloudy days. The need for backup means that the fossil fuel industry still gets to exist (and continue pumping CO2 into the atmosphere) if the way to address (if very badly) climate change is to use wind and solar.
Hydro and geothermal have the reliability to be used for baseload although they only work in some locations and hydro power probably won’t be used where it can be because of the massive environmental damage building a dam causes.
Wave and Tidal power when you calculate how much energy there is turn out to be way too diffuse to be useful. Biofuels show promise but not much because you need land to grow them on and that land could be better used growing food or even being turned back into forest.
Am a researcher in renewable energy, climate change and environment. Am looking for partners to work with.?
Am a consultant in the field of renewable energy, climate change and environment. I am interested in partnering with organisations in europe America and Asian region to synergise our expert knowledge and benefits the developing countries particularly Africa. Key areas of partnering is in proposal development, implementations of projects, exchange visits for experience building among others. Please could you give the contacts for such people/organisations.
What is the role of renewable energy in addressing climate change?
What are the advantages and disadvantages of renewable energy in to climate change? Whatare the contributions of renewable energy to climate change?
How knowledgeable are people with regards to climate change and renewable energy?
Mitigate the climate change effects through using renewable energy resources?
How would be possible to mitigate the climate change effects through using renewable energy resources focusing on bio electricity, geothermal energy and hydropower?
How would be possible to mitigate the climate change effects through using renewable energy resources?
How would be possible to mitigate the climate change effects through using renewable energy resources focusing on bio electricity, geothermal energy and hydropower?
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