Resources

Resources 6. Sources of energy and materials differ in amounts, distribution, usefulness, and the time required for their formation. As a basis for understanding this concept: a. Students know the utility of energy sources is determined by factors that are involved in converting these sources to useful forms and the consequences of the conversion process. b. Students know different natural energy and material resources, including air, soil, rocks, minerals, petroleum, fresh water, wildlife, and forests, and know how to classify them as renewable or nonrenewable. c. Students know the natural origin of the materials used to make common objects.

=Renewable Resources= A renewable resource is something that never runs out or can be renewed and that does not pollute the atmosphere like,water,wind,and the sun.In this passage I will be describing the different types of renewable resources and how they are used. =Solar Energy= Solar energy is one of the most common renewable resources because it is not limited by location. Solar energy can be used any where in the world .This resource uses a special type of panel that collects the suns solar rays and converts them into usable energy that is then stored waiting until it is needed. These panels can be found on the roof of many homes or in fields with many panels storing energy that can be used for many daily needs. =Hydroelectric Energy= Hydroelectric energy takes place in river.This resource is very limited by its location because not many places in the world have rivers.It uses a dam on a steep side of a river. The dam has tunnels that contain turbines, the moving water pushes the turbines and the movement creates energy. This resource has been used for over one hundred years the Romans used this same method to crush their grains but with a much smaller version. =Wind Power= The wind is another great resource. There are many fields all around the world full of wind mills called wind farms collecting energy. First the wind pushes the blades on the wind mill which spins the shaft which then spins the gears helping the generator create energy.The generator converts the mechanical energy of the spinning turbine into electric energy that now thanks to modern day technology can be used in many homes and buisnesses everywhere.

=Nucelear Energy= In the process called nuclear fission the nuclei of uraniam is split in a controlled process. All this happens in nuclear reactor. In a nuclear power plant during fission one, 1 killogram of uraniam can produce more energy than 3 million killograms of coal. At a nuclearpower plant bundles of rods containing uraniam are placed in thick-walled vesseles called reactores. The energy released from the fission is used to boil water that produces steam.The steam turns turbines that turn generators which produce energy. After the steam goes through the turbines it goes to a condenser that turns the steam into water again. After this series of steps the process repeats itself over again. =Geothermal Energy= Geothermal energy is energy from the earth's heated core.We get energy from this by drilling holes into the earths core. Then we collect the steam that turns the turbines which turns the gears in the generator that produces electricity.After the steam goes through the turbines in turns back into water and enters the earths core only to be heated once again. =Conclusion= California itself burns up to 80 million gallons of patrolleom a day, now imagine what all of America burns a day. What this is telling us is that we need start to start using more renewable resources because it is predicted that one day soon we will run out of fossil fuels .So we might aswell start saving our earth sooner than later.