Today we talked about different measuring rates(i.e. 1 watt hr = 860 calories, 1000 calories = 1 food calorie, 2000 food calorie = 2324 watt hr). We soon saw this from different views like how we can survive on 50 cents per day if we could survive by eating electricity.
We also compared gas heating and electric heating and concluded that electricity is not good for heating as there is an 80% efficiency in a gas or coal boiler and only a 40% efficiency in electric turbines. We soon discussed our gas bills and discussed more measuring rates(i.e. 1 therm = $1.2, 1 Kw = $0.21, 1 Therm=29.3 KwH). We also discussed about how much water an average person from different countries use like in Africa an average person might use 75 liters a day while in France an average person might use 287 liters a day.
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Ayush Zenith Samar Seth During our third meeting, we looked at the meters in the house. These include the water meter, gas meter, electricity meter. While experimenting with the water meter, we found that a small leak will not be registered by the meter, meaning that the town pays for that wasted water. However, you can almost always hear a leak through the pipes. If the water meter is moving as well, then you know it is a big leak. The faster it moves, the bigger the leak. For the electricity meter, we learned that there are two types of electrical meters, digital and analog, and it shows your electricity usage in kWh. The water and gas meters on the other hand, are measured in cubic feet. The gas meter is very complicated; there are 6 ways to turn the gas off in the house! We also learnt that on the road outside the house, there are yellow markings that show where the gas main is to your house. This means that if there is a fire, the fire department can turn off the gas supply to the house from outside so there are no explosions. There is also a similar marking for the water main, which is there in case of a flood. By-
Ayush Zenith Samar Seth For every 100 kWh of energy put into a generator, only 40 kWh can be used. This means that there is a 60% loss of energy in the form of heat. We also learnt a few conversion rates between sources of energy and kWh: 1 ton of coal = 8141 kWh, 100 mW = 100000 kWh = 12.28 tons of coal, 5000 mW = 614.18 tons of coal, and 1 gallon of gas = 35 kWh. Since we learnt that a generator produces 2000 mW of energy per hour, we found out use 5000 mW of energy to create 2000 mW of electricity per hour. Based on this data, we can calculate how much coal will be needed to power our houses per month and per year. We also learnt that one train carries approximately 15,000 tons of coal. This means that nearly one full train’s worth of coal is used every day by a single generator (24*614.18 = 14740.32). And if not coal, then the generator is using natural gas or nuclear energy. While we may have thought that a house would obviously use more energy than a car, we were completely wrong. Since 1 gallon of gas creates 35 kWh of energy, cars use about 525 kWh of energy per week. In comparison, the average house uses 600-700 kWh of energy in a month. This means that one car uses about 4 times as much energy as a house. We also learnt how much electricity is used by many products that we use in our everyday life.(i.e. Laptop, TV, and convection oven). The most astounding one was the Oven which used 533 Watts, then came the tv with 166 Watts, and last came the laptop which used 69 Watts. By-
Ayush Zenith Samar Seth In our first meeting we looked at the energy efficiency of different kinds of lightbulbs. The first thing we talked about were the different units used to measure the energy usage of an object. There are Watts, Volts, and Amps. In order to measure these we used a multimeter and we learned a few formulas relating to these units. These formulas were:VI=Wand IR=V. In these equations V means volts, I means amps, W means watts, and R means ohms. We tested halogen light bulbs, CFL light bulbs, and LED light bulbs. Of the three, LED was the most efficient. The halogen light bulb used 117.8 volts, the CFL light bulb used 59.4 volts, and the LED bulb used 9.8 volts. We also used both digital and dial calipers to measure the width of plug end of the light bulbs. We found that one side of the plug was 0.32 inches and the other side was 0.25 inches. We also found that the electricity only traveled through the smaller side of the plug. Another thing we looked at was the outlet itself. We found out that most modern outlets are tamper resistant so that babies won’t get electrocuted by sticking things in the outlet. We also looked at what the control panels for the electricity in the house look like and what the circuit breakers within them control. We talked about what the numbers and labels on the panels mean. In addition, we looked at how solar panels can create enough energy to make a house completely self-sufficient and return electricity back to the town. |
AuthorHi! My name is Ayush Zenith! I am currently a senior at Andover High School. I have been part of the Energize Andover Program since June, 2017 (8th grade). I have since been working on improving my knowledge in programming and working on writing better applications in order to save and conserve resources in buildings... Archives
November 2020
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