Powering Smallsburg
Students take a closer look at power plants.Copyright Wikimedia Commons http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ee/20060502_Lignite_powerplant_Weisweiler_Rhineland_Germany.jpg
Students act as engineers by specifying the power plants to build for a community. They are given a budget, an expected power demand from the community, and different power plant options with corresponding environmental effects. Guided by a worksheet, teams work through the hypothetical real-world scenario to arrive at recommendations that they present to the class; group "answers" vary widely, depending on their identified city priorities.
Many different types of engineering are needed to bring electric power to communities. This is a technical process—how can you transform a fuel or water or wind or sunlight to electricity—as well a societal process with societal impacts—air quality, land use, water use and security. For these reasons, chemical, mechanical, structural, electrical, environmental and civil engineers all have roles to play in power engineering.
After this activity, students should be able to:
- Define renewable and non-renewable energy.
- List some renewable and non-renewable energy sources.
- Use what they learn about energy sources to act as engineers and decide the best power plants for a (hypothetical) small community.