Writings and videos about science activities with an emphasis on environmental science and energy measurement

Showing Tag: "electricity" (Show all posts)

Generating Electricity from Living Plants

Posted by Antonio Chaves on Thursday, January 15, 2015, In : environmental news 
This video was produced by a private company that found a way to generate electricity from plants without harming them. From what I gathered in the description, they accomplish this by placing electrodes in the soil in locations that have differing voltage potentials. This electrical gradient can be attributed to the the breakdown of photosynthetic products released from the plants' roots. Much like a hydrogen fuel cell, the product of this electrochemical reaction is water. I do not know how...
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Measuring Electricity from a Photovoltaic

Posted by Antonio Chaves on Sunday, November 30, 2014, In : modified lab procedures 
I just posted a new video. The main difference with the lab manual is that instead of using a DC wattmeter I use two multimeters: One is set up to measure amps and the other is set up to measure volts. Most high schools and colleges already have multimeters (used is physics) so this can save you money. This is the same way I measured electricity generated from a cordless drill. In this new video I also incorporated a slightly more simplified equation for calculating the cost-effectiveness of ...
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New Video on Generating Electricity

Posted by Antonio Chaves on Saturday, August 16, 2014, In : new lab procedure 
I have a new video available. It is a detailed procedure on measuring the efficiency of a cordless drill generator. This is a bit more complicated than doing this with a car fan, but it generates much more watts. This procedure is also included in the new edition of the lab manual
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Electricity storage is a big dea

Posted by Antonio Chaves on Friday, July 19, 2013, In : miscellaneous science news 
I got this interesting chart from an article about how an energy storage company called Eos may revolutionize the way electricity is stored using zinc air batteries. I never knew that so much generating capacity was stored by simply pumping water! The advantage of these batteries is their low cost ($160 / kWh vs. $400 / kWh using lithium batteries). All of this is discussed in terms of making the grid more reliable. I wonder if these batteries are light enough to use in a vehicle? 

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Department of Energy Website Overhaul

Posted by Antonio Chaves on Friday, March 22, 2013, In : modified lab procedures 
Someone totally redesigned the Department of Energy website making the information that you need for the Lab 2-2 (Transportation) is harder to find. Worst of all, the links on the main website (which has been renamed www.energy.gov) are little more than window dressing for impressing impressionable taxpayers. This page is useless to us because we cannot use it to navigate to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Even putting this name in the "search" box does not work! So here it the li...

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About this blog

This blog was originally created in January 2013 to serve as a means for providing updates on science activities from the environmental science lab manual Ecology, Development, and Sustainability. I have now expanded its purpose to include other items of interest to science teachers. 

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