Energy Efficiency World
Matching Activity:
This lesson explains five forms of energy. Students must match the pictures with their definitions. The campfire and the nuclear power plant each represent two forms of energy.
• The campfire represents radiant energy and chemical energy.
• The jellybeans represent chemical energy.
• The lightning represents electrical energy.
• The child kicking the ball represents mechanical energy.
• The nuclear power plant represents nuclear energy. It also depicts electrical energy, as nuclear energy is used at this plant to generate electricity.
Page 3: Energy Moves
Objective: To explain how energy can be transferred and transformed.
Background/Discussion: Energy is transferred in many ways. Discuss some ways energy can move, or be transferred, from one object to another. Transfer of heat energy is an easy one to understand as there are so many examples of it in our daily life: heat moves from an oven burner to a teakettle, from the sun to us, from a blow dryer to our hair. Discuss some ways energy can change, or be transformed, from one form to another. Examples: When fuels are burned, their chemical energy is transformed into heat. When a car runs on gasoline, the engine converts the gas into the mechanical energy that makes the wheels go.
Page 4: Where Does Electricity Come From?
Objective: To explain how electricity gets from the power plant to buildings.
Background/Discussion: This illustration is a simplified diagram of the path electricity takes to get from the power plant to a building. The illustration does not include a depiction of underground power lines, so be sure to explain that in some neighborhoods power lines are not on poles but buried under the ground. Students may wonder how the generator actually creates electricity. Simply put, when a magnet spins near a copper wire, the electrons in that wire move from one atom to another. This movement of electrons results in a flow of electricity in the wire.
Activity Answers:
1. power plant (given)
2. generator
3. electricity
4. power lines
5. substation
6. distribution lines
7. homes
Page 5: The Many Sources of Electricity
Objective: To explain the many sources of energy used to generate electricity and to help students distinguish between renewable and non-renewable energy.
Background/Discussion: Before teaching this lesson, discuss the meaning of the word “replenished”—to make full or complete again by supplying what has been used up. Explain to students that no matter what fuels produce the electricity they use, their lights shine, their radios play, and their computers run in the same way. Explain that the fuels used to generate most of the electricity used in this country include fossil fuels—coal, oil, and natural gas—followed by nuclear energy and hydropower. Here is some more background on various fuel sources and how they are used to produce electricity: