Clean Power

If each region of the country was independently powered by renewable resources, we could reduce our carbon footprint to a miniscule fraction of what it is today. Each region in the United States has some form of a renewable resource, which is able to sustain reliable power to the people living in the area. On the east coast wind power is a viable option. The amount of energy we could potentially harvest from offshore wind turbines is substantial enough to supply power to most rural and suburban communities. The fact the continental shelf gradually slopes off into the Atlantic makes wind farms a great option. In the midwest a combination of wind power and solar power could produce enough energy to sustain small rural communities, but a majority of the power would still come from large power plants. The reason for this is the midwest does not have a large potential for renewable power. On the west coast the potential for solar energy is very large especially in the south-west states like Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. If large solar powerplants were constructed in these areas much of the power demand could me met. The west coast also has a potential for wind energy, but the fact the continental shelf quickly drops off into the Pacific reduces the viability of large wind turbines, unless new technology for floating turbines is developed. Large cities such as New York and Los Angeles may have a demand which proves to large for renewable resources to sustain, but that’s where nuclear power comes in. Nuclear power is capable of supplying mass amounts of energy to areas which demand high amounts of power. Nuclear power would supply enough power to make up the difference if said renewable resources ever failed to produce. By shifting our dependence from fossil fuels to nuclear and renewable power we can reduce our emissions, and possibly reverse the effects of global warming.

Problems with Wind Energy

There are many advantages to using wind energy, however, there are drawbacks also. The fact the wind is not a consistently reliable resource causes problems in the form of where to locate these wind turbines. There is test which can be done to measure annual wind potential such as putting an anemometer in a set location for twelve months. This process is very time-consuming, but a necessary step in determining whether building a turbine is economically worth the cost in that said location. However necessary these anemometers are for determining the viability of a location they can have false readings and sometimes prove faulty. Wind is not only inconsistent, but also is very shifty and can shift directions quickly and frequently. The solution to this problem has already been solved with vertical axis turbines, which have two offset blades facing opposite directions. Since the blades are facing in two opposite directions they need no mechanism to keep them pointed into the optimum wind direction. Horizontal axis wind turbines have more trouble staying in the wind seeing the position of the blade only allow wind to flow one way through the blades. This problem has been solved with an anemometer connected to a wind vane, which measures wind speed and direction through the use of a computer. This computer is connected to the yaw drive, which controls the direction in which the turbine is facing, and constantly keeps it facing in the appropriate direction. By using such devices this reduces the need for human supervision, resulting in a more efficient process. The more time and energy we dedicate to researching this resource the more efficient the technology for harvesting them will become.

More Wind Potential

Wind energy has much potential because it is a renewable resource that will never run out. The wind is a resource which can be more reliable than solar because the wind can blow day or night. In fact the wind is “most reliable during the coldest and darkest nights of winter when energy is needed most.” Another phenomenon which makes wind very reliable is the Sea-Breeze Cycle. The Sea Breeze Cycle is “an example of how the wind works.” During the day the sun heats up both the water and shore, however the land heats up faster than the water creating low pressure. This low pressure (hot air) will rise and consequently pulls the cooler air off the water and over the land creating a wind. During the evening and at night the exact opposite happens. The land will cool faster than the water and the wind will move offshore. When considering the highest potential for wind energy one must locate where the wind is in fact the strongest. According to Chapter 5 Renewable Energy Sources II: Alternatives Section 5.3 Wind Power the potential for wind energy is highest is at 300 meters. However; stable structures that high are impractical and too expensive to build. So most commercial turbines are constructed at about 50 meters, making them high enough to capture about 80% of the winds full potential. Wind turbines have been used for many years for practical use on farms because wind is quite readily available. If we were to invest more energy into the research and development of wind harvesting, we very well could reduce our energy on oil and other fossil fuels.

Dams as an energy source

There are many sources of renewable energy besides wind power. One of these is water power, dams are one way to efficiently harvest power from water. Dams convert the potential energy of water into kinetic energy by sending water under extreme pressure through a turbine and then release it down stream. One dam we are all familiar with is the Hoover dam. There are many drawbacks to this energy source one of which is the damming of streams, rivers, and lakes affects the migratory and spawning routes of many fish species. By doing this many fish species are unable to spawn and consequently populations collapse due to the over harvest of these fish because they are unable to replace themselves. Dams, like the Hoover dam, also discharge cold water downstream which affects the aquatic life living downstream. By discharging the cold water from the bottom the reservoir downstream many fish species have to either adapt or migrate out of an area, which in turn affects the productivity of said area. We have relied on dams as an energy source for many years, but now that we have researched and developed new technologies we are able to decrease our reliance on dams. If we were to destroy these dams the productivity of the area effected by the dam could soon recover, resulting in the rebound and recovery of the many species that have been affected.

Offshore Wind

For many years people have been interested in renewable resources so we could reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. At the rate  in which we consume the limited reserves of fossil fuels we have left, we will indeed run out by the turn of the next century. The only way we can reduce our consumption is to invest and develop new technologies to harvest renewable resources such as wind. The most productive way to harvest wind energy is with offshore wind turbines. The only reasonable place to put these turbines is offshore because space and wind is readily available. The potential for offshore wind farms is far superior to that of producing offshore oil. There are many reasons which make offshore wind better than offshore drilling such as cost, environmental impacts, and availability of the said resource.

The cost of building an offshore wind turbine would be more than that of building an onshore wind turbine because the forces which would be asserted on the turbine offshore are far greater than those of an onshore turbine. It’s not the fact offshore turbines are better, but the fact they are more consistent in power production. Offshore wind is so much more readily available because wind shearing, or the blocking of wind due to obstructing obstacles like trees, is reduced which in turn produces more consistent and steady winds.

The environmental impact of an offshore wind turbine is less than that of an onshore turbine because fertile lands which could be used for farming or a number of other things are left alone. The building of turbines offshore is actually beneficial and does not “render these areas (of seabed) sterile…. evidence suggests offshore structures, likened to artificial reefs, can in fact lead to an increase in the amount of marine life in an area.” By increasing the marine productivity of a region, wind turbines can be rendered beneficial to habitats which otherwise would remain baren wastelands. In conclusion if we were to utilize renewable resources and decrease our dependence on oil we could in fact reverse some of the environmental damage we have caused. 

Philosophical Transactions: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences
Vol. 361, No. 1813, Mathematics, Physics and Engineering (Dec. 15, 2003), pp. 2909-2930

Air Pollution

This blog is a response to an article based on air pollutants and how they are directly connected to asthma. The article Hazardous Air Pollutants and Asthma written by George Leikauf explains which air pollutants increase the number of asthma related deaths. One major point made in the article is compounds “could be considered toxic depending on the magnitude of human exposure, the dose delivered to the target organ, and the biological response.” Well depending on the size of the dose any chemical or toxin is in fact dangerous and hazardous to the human condition. Nearly all industrial processes result in air pollution whether it be factories or oil refineries. The one process which all humans take for granted is what happens in the internal combustion engine. Even though this one invention makes our lifestyle possible, many people forget the process of internal combustion is a very dirty and wasteful practice. If one was to go to the outskirts of any major city, say Beijing for example, and look back toward the city, one would see a haze looming over the city. The haze also known as smog is a result of human pollution. Many chemicals make up smog, but the exhaust from cars is a major contributor. If we could change our lifestyles and decide to walk or ride a bike instead of drive our cars the two miles to school everyday, the air we breath would be much cleaner. And as a result people would be much healthier.

The advantages of using wind energy

In recent years people discovered the importance of renewable energy and the advantages of using them. One renewable energy source is the wind. There are many advantages to wind power such as wind turbines are relatively easy and cheap to build and maintain, they supply cheap electricity, and emit no Green house gases. Wind generated power has also decreased in cost over the last twenty years. Advances in new technology allow new wind power plants to generate electricity for less than five cents per kilowatt-hour, that’s an eighty percent decrease from the 1980s when wind power use to run for thirty cents/kWh (AmericanWind1). The new power plants can now offer power for a price, which can now compete with cheap power from coal-fired and nuclear power plants. There are also advantages to building large wind turbine instead of small ones. The fact is bigger wind turbines may cost more, however, they produce cheaper electricity, and cost less to maintain making them superior to smaller turbines. Since the larger turbines take up more space the question arises of where to put them, and where is the best location to maximize production. The answer is offshore, being offshore solves many of the simple problems people have with wind turbines. Problems such as noise and sight pollution. By being offshore the only people able to hear the turbines are fishermen, and with turbines being thirteen miles offshore (which is the horizon from sea-level) the turbines would appear as only dots. These wind turbines offshore would also create habitat for many aquatic animals, doubling its use as a sanctuary. Wind power is a great thing, seeing the wind is readily available it seems logical we should harvest whatever energy we can from this renewable resource. The environmental impact wind turbines have is well worth the cost, and with a small ecological footprint wind turbines can be located in just about anywhere.

American Wind Energy Association. Wind Web Tutorial. 1996-2009. 6 Dec. 2009. http://www.awea.org/faq/wwt_costs.html#top

Fundamentals of Using Energy

The reading this week comes from chapter 1: Energy Fundamentals, Energy Use in an Industrial Society. In class this week each group presented one section, and the section I presented was 1.2- Why Do We Use So Much Energy? The section discusses the amount of oil used per capita in an industrialized nation compared to that of a unindustrialized nation. A quote straight from the reading which might clarify the point is “A citizen of a developing country might use the energy equivalent of less than one barrel of oil per year, compared to an annual energy equivalent of 20 to 60 barrels per capita for the most industrialized countries.” The fact is people from an unindustrialized nation might use less oil, but if they had access to the same technologies as people from an industrialized nation they would most certainly use more. It’s in human nature to be as lazy as possible, and we will exploit any resource we can in order to do so. Fossil fuels have given man the power to shape the earth anyway he so chooses, but at what cost? At the cost of using up all of the oil reserves, and depleting the energy source we depend on so greatly.

Effect of Oil on Habitat Use

The article I chose to use for this blog entry is Changing Habitat and Habitat Use by Birds after the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill, 1989-2001. This study assesses the effects and consequences oil spills have on the health of an ecosystem by studying twenty-five different bird species. The study was conducted in Prince William Sound, Alaska, the sight of the Exxon Valdez oil spill. The study observed ten bays located in the Sound, some were very polluted by oil while others not so much. In conclusion the study was unable to conclude how the recovery dynamics work because the effects of oil are to long lasting for a short term study to fully understand.

Final Portfolio

Sam Bedinger

Professor Meehan

5/2/10

Reflection:

            As I revise this essay I will be attempting to strengthen my thesis by reinforcing the importance of acquiring a deep reading state. I also intend on restating and elaborating on why Wikipedia is not a legitimate source because it lacks meaning, and takes away from the reality of the classroom experience. The importance of the classroom experience is in effect what defines us as a generation of students. Since the reality of our classroom experience has constantly been changing each generation is defined differently. The difference between my father’s experience and mine is so great we would not even consider the other to be a legitimate student. By grouping and reorganizing my essay I will attempt to combine certain points therefore strengthening my essay. By going back and thinking this essay from the ground up, I will take my ideas further and elaborate more on the point of each paragraph. Essentially clarifying my point and helping my audience understand my thoughts and ideas more clearly. After reading this essay I believe my audience should understand through technology students have in fact become more lazy, and have been stripped of their rightful classroom reality. The reality which our fathers experienced, where things are learned from people and life experiences, not technology. Technology has in a sense made life easy for us, students no longer must spend the allotted time looking information up because the information is spoon fed to us through technology and online sources such as Wikipedia. I believe you can learn this through my critical evaluation of Wikipedia as an online text.

Critically Evaluating Wikipedia as an Online Text

            Wikipedia has become one of the most renowned encyclopedias in the last five years. Due to Wikipedia’s major success in revolutionizing how people use encyclopedias, people have lost the use for hard back copies of encyclopedias such as World Book. The very purpose of Wikipedia was to create an easy to use online encyclopedia. However when critically evaluating Wikipedia as a legitimate online text there are possible arguments for both sides. Wikipedia is not a legitimate text because articles offer no deep reading, they lack meaning, they take away from the reality of the classroom experience, and also any information acquired from the text cannot be deemed as credible information.

            When trying to accomplish deep reading, time is a requirement because it takes time to acquire a mind-set. Deep reading is the mind-set where nothing else matters. You are so lost in your false reality created by the book or text, reality seems to not even exist. Birkerts, who touches on this idea of deep reading, would say “Electricity… is about immediacy; it is in the nature of current to surmount impedances. Electricity is, implicitly, of the moment- now…. Duration is deep time, time experienced without the awareness of time passing”(Birkerts 219). Wikipedia offers a quick and easy way to acquire information. Wikipedia through technology has made the answer to any question as simple as taking out your smart phone, which has 4G network, and looking it up. Readers would find the information they need then move on to another topic. Technology in this sense has led us away from reality. Information and knowledge is no longer learn the natural way. For so many years people learn in a classroom setting. What they learned in school and from day-to-day life was all they knew. This was a time before technology, when you could not look up Phi Sigma on the internet and instantly know it was founded in 1782 by George Washington. Once again in order to acquire deep reading, readers have to spend time reading. By making it easier for readers to acquire a basic understanding they do not need to spend the time required to read the article completely. Reading the whole article would take a duration of time, a time it would take to acquire that certain mind-set. One where you can get lost in the pages and nothing matters except the words inscribed on the page. Wikipedia has in effect has stripped readers of a false reality because articles lack meaning and deep thought. All there is on Wikipedia is fact, there is no thought required to read Wiki articles.

             Wikipedia is a source for information which anyone can post information on. The fact information posted on Wikipedia does not always come from a scholarly source, and could be false or incorrect, is the reason Wikipedia is not a source one should go to and quote directly from. Even though this is made very easy to do seeing Wikipedia was made so that users could quickly pin point information. Non-credible information serves as a problem for many college students, who use Wikipedia daily to look up answers quickly. This may cause students to get crucial information wrong which could lead to a bad grade on a paper. Teachers know this and advise students not to use Wikipedia as a primary resource, but pupils continue to use it because of its simplicity.

            Even though the articles are not always from a credible source most of them are. Wikipedia has editors who edit the posts daily. Since posts are edited by scholars, the posts may be considered a good starting point for papers. However, readers should find a credible source confirming the information posted on Wikipedia. By using Wikipedia as a starting point a basic understanding of the material is attained, but readers should find credible sources to quote from in their paper.

            By making information so easy to acquire, Wikipedia has in effect made readers lazy. No longer is there a need to use hard text copies of encyclopedias. Because the information has become so much easier and, in effect, more efficient when gathered from an online text, Wikipedia allows students to complete assignments quicker. Quicker does not always mean more correct, and if students weren’t so lazy they would look it up in their text. By using the appropriate text, students would acquire the correct information the first time around. However, Wikipedia enables users to understand the key points of an article, but then serves as a source for distraction because the page is covered in links, which may send you to other related articles. Readers no longer need to read a whole article to grasp the basic understanding of said article, but instead they acquire a basic overview of the topic in the first paragraph. Therefore readers do not sit and read Wikipedia articles for hours on end. Therefore concluding Wikipedia does not serve as a source for meaningful deep reading.

            However, there are counter arguments, that express a positive side to Wikipedia. The reason Wikipedia became so useful in the first place is because Wikipedia serves as a quick and immediate source for information. By making information so easy to attain people started to use Wikipedia daily to acquire a basic understanding of current events. Many people like college students need a quick and easy source for basic information; it makes doing homework much easier. Who would want to spend the extra five minutes required to look up article in a hard text encyclopedia, when they could just type it in and get immediate results? Remember “Electricity… is about immediacy” and that is what people today want. Immediacy allows people the option to complete tasks quicker and without complication. Essentially reducing the potential for error by supplying information quickly first time around.

             There are also enough articles on a variety of topics to compare to an encyclopedia, and many of these articles offer readers a more comprehensible understanding of the topic. Not only does Wikipedia offer a variety of topics, nearly three and a half million, it also offers them in a variety of languages. People all over the world can use Wikipedia because it is offered in ten different languages. Users can use Wikipedia to look up nearly anything from cooking recipes to historical documents.

            The question is: in order for a text to be considered literal, do you need to acquire a deep reading state? The answer is yes. A literal source has to offer deep reading so that readers can escape into a false reality, as Birkerts explains. “What no one seems to be acknowledging, what is at the root of the crisis of the art, is the fact that nature of reality, of the average person’s experience of reality, has changed, changed utterly”(Birkerts 205). No longer is the reality of the classroom a teacher reading notes from a book, and writing those notes on the board in chalk. Instead the reality of today’s classroom is run by a projector and a laptop. The face of academia has changed, “changed utterly” since my father was in school, actually since my brother was in school. I personally have seen this change, when I was in lower school my teachers never used laptops and all their grades were written down in a grade book. By high school every teacher was using power point presentations, and everything they needed was contained in their laptop. The reason for this is because technology is constantly evolving making everything easier today than it was a week ago. The reason why my generation is considered the technology generation is because technology has evolved more during our time than it has in any other.

            There are many reasons Wikipedia is a good source for acquiring information. It is quick, easy and offers readers a good understanding on a variety of topics. The fact that many articles are not written by credible sources makes Wikipedia a non reliable resource. Wikipedia serves a good source for acquiring basic info, but it does not always supply readers with accurate information. Wikipedia is in a sense a pin pointing resource, which makes finding information fast and easy. By making information so easily accessible readers are not able to access a deep reading state making Wikipedia not a literal source. Without allowing readers the option of acquiring a deep reading state Wikipedia has once again change the reality of the classroom. Therefore, Wikipedia in effect serves as a distraction for users trying to reach a deep reading state because it lacks meaning. Meaning is in a sense purpose and without purpose Wikipedia cannot be considered a legitimate source.

Birkerts, Sven. The Gutenberg Elegies. The Fate of Reading in an Electronic Age. New York, 1994.