Lisa Allard SCI-184c

Fukushima Daiichi

On March 11th, 2011 an earth quake hit Japan triggering a catastrophic tsunami that hit Japan’s coast. Before the disaster Japan got more than 30% of its electrical power from Nuclear energy spread out over 54 power plants. Japan and the U.S. had previously even signed an agreement to further research into Nuclear capabilities. Seismic activity had been a concern for Japan previously but the Nuclear catastrophe that ensued at Fukushima forever changed the perspective on Nuclear energy for the Japanese people and government. The tsunami disabled the cooling system at the power plant, releasing mass amounts of radioactive material into the surrounding area. The meltdown forced an evacuation within a 30km radius and banned all food grown in the area from being sold. While there weren’t any deaths from the exposure of radiation directly it has caused dozens of people to become exposed to the material as well as the surrounding environment to be contaminated for many years to come. The Fukushima disaster also forced Japanese officials to reconsider its use of nuclear power. Since the accident they have decided to begin to phase out their nuclear power plants and find new ways of producing energy, shutting down the majority of their power plants from 54 to only 6. While the nation is currently getting more of its energy from fossil fuels in the process of the nuclear phase out, they too are pushing for greener energy possibilities including building a wind farm off of the Fukushima coast.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/15/world/asia/15nuclear.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Country-Profiles/Countries-G-N/Japan/

http://www.eastwestcenter.org/sites/default/files/private/api103.pdf

Solar Energy

(a picture of the solar panels at my grandparents home in Germany)

Solar energy uses various processes to use the energy directly from our suns heat and light to store and produce electrical energy. The most commonly seen form is through solar panels on the roofs of houses for example. This uses the suns light and through photovoltaic cells, or solar cells, generates an electric current which can be used or stored. This happens because the cells are made of  what is called a semiconductor material. The sunlight hits the cell and the electrons begin to move away from their atoms. It is the electrons that bounce throughout the cell that then generates an electric current. Other ways of using the suns energy are through thermal or heating systems. This process uses the suns thermal energy to heat water systems directly in your own home. Enough of the suns energy hits the earth to be able to power the energy needs of our world each year. Unfortunately most of this energy currently gets wasted or bounces back off and into the atmosphere. Using solar energy is not only completely clean and emission free but over time can also save on energy costs. The European Union is currently the worlds leader in producing green energy. Germany itself gets more than 25% of its energy from renewable sources. Using green energy is not only better for the environment but also has benefits like tax exemptions and being able to get money back from the government for producing an excess of your own energy. My grandparents house in Germany was a flour mill and a saw mill for many years. We have been producing our own water energy through a river that runs through a turbine in our house. Recently we decided to put solar panels on our roof as well. We in turn sell the energy we make from both our solar and our hydro power to a power company which then distributes it back to other users. The company pays us each year for the energy we produce for free.

http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/global-warming/solar-power-profile/

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390443659204577575203384685874.html

http://www.solarenergy.com/academic.aspx

Generator Lab

In this lab we used the example of a flashlight which uses magnetic coils to generate electricity. The concept is quite simple, the generator converts mechanical energy to produce electric energy. Michael Faraday was the first to produce a successful electromagnetic generator by using copper disks rotating between a magnetic horseshoe which produced direct current electricity. In our lab we used a flashlight which had a magnet and copper coils inside. By shaking the magnet through the coils we were able to produce electricity just as Faraday did in 1831. We calculated the electricity we could produce depending on how fast we shook the magnet over the course of 30 seconds. By taking the sum of all squares for the electricity produced per second we were able to calculate the average voltage produced between 80 and 140 shakes per 30 seconds. Essentially, we used our own mechanical energy to shake themagnet through the coils and produce our own electric voltage. Pretty cool!

Hydraulic Fracturing

Hydraulic Fracturing also known as “fracking” is the process in which pressurized liquid is used to fracture layers of rock below the earths surface to extract Petroleum and Natural Gas, both of which are fossil fuels. Fracking was first seen decades ago but it is just in recent years that it has been used to extract shale gas. Fracking has been proven to have many environmental impacts including increased seismic activity, contamination of nearby water supplies and ground water, surface contaminations from spilling and leaking and decreased air quality from various gasses leaking into our atmosphere. While it is an efficient process for extracting gasses which were previously inaccessible, Fracking is now coming under serious scrutiny for its negative environmental impacts. Fracking also uses a large amount of water transported by various means to be able to extract the gases at all in combination with many different types of chemicals all which have various possibly even negative impacts on the surrounding areas. While fracking is effective in extracting Natural Gas, a cleaner fossil fuel than most others, it still increases our dependency on fossil fuels as well as having an extremely negative impact on our environment.

http://www.dangersoffracking.com/

http://www.propublica.org/special/hydraulic-fracturing-national

http://www2.epa.gov/hydraulicfracturing

U.S. Smart Grid Energy

Smart Grid Energy is essentially a new way of communicating between the grid and the consumers home. Previously the U.S. energy grid was just bringing electricity to the consumer, this did not include green energy which had to come from a separate source. The usage and meters would then be read by separate individuals who would bring the information back to the grid to then be able to bill the user. Now, with Smart Grid technology it opened up a new line of communication. It brings several forms of energy including green energies such as wind and water to the grid and then to the consumer. The consumers usage then gets communicated back to the grid through computer technology for billing and processing. This allows the U.S. energy grid to be a lot more efficient as well as more green. Another plus for using the smart grid is that it realizes faults in lines that create power outages. Instead of waiting for the lines to get fixed the smart grid reroutes the electricity from another line so the consumers home does not lose power.

References:

Energy.gov

Smartgrid.gov

Cggc.duke.edu

Lego Robot Experiment