Spin to win using the power of heat :Can geothermal and wind energy unite ?
Proposal:
Our world receives free energy from the sun, wind and water but within the earth an extremely hot temperature is present, which provides us with the capability to produce a lot on energy up on the surface. (Tabak 2013) The potential for utilizing this source appears to be unlimited.(Gates 2013)This is called geothermal energy and this renewable resource highly interested our group as it is becoming a reliable and eco friendly source to produce energy in this world. In our project ,we hope to achieve and prove how geothermal energy coupled with a wind turbine can lead our worlds success with a new way of using renewable resources to produce a large portion of functional energy. We will be constructing a model of a geothermal power plant to test different size of turbine blades can produce a various amount of voltage.The turbine will be attached to a generator then connecting to a voltameter through a simple circuit .As we will change mechanical energy into chemical energy by using the geothermal energy to physically power a light bulb ,when the volts are transferred through the remainder of the circuit. The different amount of volts produced will represent how much energy can be obtained in a real size turbine blade . This has a huge effect on how much energy is produced. Wind power has become much more popular as people realize its great potential ,as it will never cease to exist as it creates no pollution or burning of fossil fuels like many of the other renewable resources. (Windustry 2012) We believe that in this project we can prove and investigate more than how different turbine sizes affect how much energy is produced ,but as well as how the earths natural resources are able to power the world in a sufficient way. This project will allow us to discover a new way to power and generate a large portion of energy for our world.
Hypothesis: If different sizes of turbines(independent variable) are tested through geothermal renewable energy resources, than the larger one will create the most amount of rotations per minute(dependant variable) because the amount of power you produce is determined by the square of the rotor blade radius. Meaning that increasing the size of the turbine has an exponential effect on the power. When a wind turbine grasps the force of wind velocity with rotor blades power is creating. Since the. rotor blades are designed to accelerate airflow over once surface of the blade. the larger one will accelerate and produce the most energy .(USDA 2013)The controlled variables are the the size of the hole in the geothermal power plant , the temperature of the stove and how far away the turbine in from the model of the geothermal power plant.
Independent variable: Size of the turbine
Dependent variable: the amount of rotations per minute
Controlled variables: the temperature of the stove , how far away the turbine is from the the model of the geothermal power plant and the size of the hole in the geothermal power plant.
Materials:
· Three different sizes of a pinwheel (small, medium and large)
· Clean metal can with one lid removed, 14.5-ounces; available at any grocery store
· Hammer
· Nail, 1/8-inch diameter
· Wood ruler or thin piece of wood, 12 inches long
· Rubber bands (2)
· Medium-sized pot, 3 quarts
· Aluminum foil
· Stove top
· Permanent marker
· Timer
· Oven mitt
· Lab notebook
· Voltmeter
· Generator (from rechargeable flashlight)
· Alligator clips
· Small light bulb (1.5 volts)
· Copper wire
· Chopstick
· Straw
Procedure Part 1 making the power plant
1. Using a hammer and nail a hole is made at the edge of the lid that is still attached. Make another hole opposite the
first hole you have made. Both of the holes should be no larger should be no larger than 1/8 inch in diameter.
2. Attaching the ruler, vertically to the side of the can, using rubber bands. Position the ruler so its between the two holes. Make sure that the bottom edge of the ruler is flush with the bottom edge of the metal can. The can and the ruler shouldn’t be titled when placed on a flat surface. The open end of the can is facing down.
3. Fill your 3-quart pot with 2 quarts (or just over half full) of tap water. Take a piece of aluminum foil and place it on top of the pot. Crimp the foil down over the edges of the pot so that the water is sealed in. Take another piece of foil and place it on top of the first piece of foil. Crimp the second piece to ensure that when the water boils, no steam can get out from the edges. The foil-covered pot models the earth. The aluminum foil is the crust, covering the heat that is within the earth.
4. Gently poke a hole in the center of the aluminum foil pieces, using the nail. Make sure that the nail goes through both layers of aluminum foil. The hole should be no larger than 1/8 inch in diameter.
5. Turn the stovetop on medium to medium high and place the pot on top of the flame or hot surface. Note the setting of the stovetop in your lab notebook in a data table like the one shown below. The heat setting should be hot enough to boil water; however, make sure that the water doesn't boil so heavily that water hits the foil.
6. Make one large mark on the back of the pinwheel at the base of the spokes with the permanent marker. You want to be able to see the mark clearly while the pinwheel is spinning.
7. Wait for the water to boil. When you see steam coming out of the hole and the foil cover is slightly inflated, you are ready to start the experiment.
8. Hold the pinwheel, facing down, above the can over both holes. See Figure 4, below. Make sure that the ruler is not in the way of the pinwheel and that the pinwheel is parallel to the can's top. If necessary, push the ruler down gently so that the can doesn't move too much. The pinwheel will start spinning. Note the height at which you are holding the pinwheel. You can use the ruler to determine the height. Write any marking on one blade of the radius and count how many time it rotates in one minute using your timer.
9. Repeat step 8 with the two other sizes of turbines and record your results.
Procedure part 2 attaching the turbine to the circuit
Please note that this part of our project was unable to function as we originally planned to attach the turbine to a voltmeter to light a light bulb .Due to unforced airs, it was unable to happen. We realized we needed our turbine to be made of a stronger material to have enough energy to power the generator. When dealing with a real wind turbine and geothermal power plant we believe after researching that our original project would still be possible if we found a functional way to hook the generator up to the stronger turbine. Our altered project is listed in the steps above but here is part two of how you could create a stronger turbine to power the generator into creating electricity.
1) After the geothermal power plant model is all set up you will start connecting the circuit to begin your process of changing mechanical into chemical energy.
2) Instead of using a normal toy pinwheel as we did try making your turbine out of steel to give it some strength resulting in the ability for more power to be produced. Take your turbine and insert a straw through the middle of it.
3) Now using the generator from the rechargeable flashlight use the gear and attach it to the crank. Since the turbine is now made of steel being metal when it turns it will attract to the 4 coil magnets in the generator allowing them to spin at the same time producing energy.
4) Place two alligator clips on the stripped copper wire on the side of the generator then attach the other end of them into the voltammeter.
5) Continuing your simple circuit attach two more alligator clips to the ones in the voltameter to the small light bulb. Now your circuit is complete and you are able to conduct the experiment.
Part 3 conducting the experiment
If the experiment did work this is how we assume the experiment would take place
1) Refer back to part one step 8. Start from there when the turbine was spinning from the steam produced by the geothermal power plant ,the steel turbine would attract to the generator causing the magnets inside of it to move back and forth. Energy is created and it moves through the circuit and will need to produce at least 1.5 volts in order for the voltameter to light the light bulb.
Observations : Large turbine was slow but steady and when speed incresed it stayed going at a face pace for a long period of time
medium: sped up and slowed down many times and due to the fact it was only a toy pinwheel sometimes came to a complete stop
small turbine : Only sped up twice up to 10 seconds and was very slow for most of the time
Discussion
In our hypothesis we stated that if different sizes of turbines are tested through geothermal renewable energy resources, than the largest turbine will create the most rotations per minute. After finishing the experiment and reviewing results our predictions were proven correct. Due to the fact that the research stated that the amount of energy produced with a wind turbine is determined by square of the rotor blade radius . A bigger turbine blade allows more energy to be produced because more steam from the geothermal power plant was taken in , in comparison to the other sizes. The largest turbine had spun 101 times, the middle 61 and the smallest 54 times.
To perform our experiment we first had to put together all the individual pieces. We had to put together our power plant using a ruler, a can and rubber bands and poke holes into it using a nail, this was done so that the steam could protrude through from the boiling water underneath and spin the turbine. We next had to fill the pot 2/3 full of water, cover it with tinfoil, poke a hole in the middle and set it on the stove on medium-high. We then placed the power plant on top and waited for the water to boil. Once the water was at a boil, we held the pinwheel overtop of the power plant (making sure the pinwheel didn’t hit the ruler) and counted the amount of rotations in one minute. We repeated this three times in order to test each pinwheel, keeping in mind that the pinwheel was held at the same height each time. Our experiment was originally quite complicated with many variables that needed to be considered and look at closely.We were very precise when We intended on adding a simple circuit including a generator , voltmeter and 1.5 volt light bulb. unfortunately ,we were unable to hook up to generator to the turbine so we could transfer the energy produced by the turbine into usable electricity. We realized that as a result of the poor material choice of pinwheel it was not strong enough to power a 1.5 lightbulb. Although it seems like an obvious answer we seemed to think before researching that the smaller turbine would produce the most energy because it would be able to spin at a faster pace. Only after realizing that as the blade radius is increased a huge impact is made on energy production.When the altered experiment was conducted all the variables were considered. The controlled variables being the heat of the stove , how far away the turbine was from the geothermal power plant and the size of the whole in the geothermal power plant. The independent variable in our experiment was the size of the turbine blades and the dependant variable was the number of rotations per minute the turbine conducted.
When we used steam to rotate the pinwheel the size of turbine did indeed matter. As you can see in the graph the turbine with the largest blade had a noticeable higher amount of rotations than the other two sizes. Since the width of the blades on the largest turbine allowed it to collect more steam and rotate faster, it did more rotations out of the three. The other two were much closer in terms of rotations. The middle had spun 61 times and the smallest 54, this was predicted though as they have a smaller surface area to take up steam with. The outcome of the experiment was positive collecting the same results we had hope to originally only in a more simple way. Despite the fact that the circuit did not work our research and results still match . Leading us to believe that our background research was correct and larger turbine blades do in fact produce more energy.
Overall our experiment was successful; however, some things didn’t work exactly as planned. Our initial experiment as we explained before including the generator attached to the turbine then connected to a voltmeter to measure the volts produced per turbine. After countless attempts we were unable to get the generator working properly and attached to the turbine. This set us back a lot in our experiment as we took up most of our work classes trying to get it to work. This would be one of the only things we would change. If the turbine was made of steel it would attract to the magnets in the generator allowing it to spin and steel would also give it more strength to produce more power. Another issue we came along during our experiment was that the turbines kept falling off the chopsticks. If it hadn’t it might have changed the results we received with the medium and small turbines. If we were ever to perform the experiment again, we would definitely find a better way to measure the volts and use the generator, but we just didn’t have the time this time around, to make it work.
Conclusion
In my hypothesis I suggested that if different sizes of turbines are tested through geothermal renewable energy resources, than the larger one will create the most amount of rotations per minute because the amount of power you produce is If determined by the square of the blade radius. Meaning that increasing the size of the turbine has an exponential effect on the power. This statement was proven correct. The results stated that the larger turbine spun 101 times spinning the most out of the three because of the width of the blades, the more surface area there was the more steam it was able to collect spun the turbines faster. The other two turbines were closer together in the amount of times they spun. The medium turbine spun 61 times in one minute and the small turbine spun 54 times. All the variables were considered during this experiment. Are main objective was to hook the project up to the circuit so we could produce volts. This was unsuccessful when we tried the various amounts of times. A source of error that we had during this experiment is that the turbines fell off the chopsticks a few times, meaning that the number of rotations could have been higher if they had not. Overall are experiment was successful. If we were to conduct this experiment again I think we would use a different generator so it would be possible to collect volts. Also we would use a less flimsy turbine made from steel.
References
E, A., & Richie, D. (n.d.). Geothermal energy. In Encyclopedia of Earthquakes and Volcanoes (Third ed., p. 1). Retrieved from Facts On File: Science Online database.
Electric Devices and circuits. (n.d.). Retrieved from Facts On File: Science Online database.
Knight, J. (2004, July 31). Freedom to harvest the wind. In Science encyclopedia. Retrieved January 8, 2013, from http://www.2facts.com/tsof_story.aspx?PIN=s1201703&term=wind+turbine
National geophysical research institute, H. G. (2007). Geothermal energy an alternative resources for the 21st century. Hyderabad, India: Elsevier.
Science Online. (n.d.). Retrieved from Facts On File: Science Online database.
United states department of agriculture. (n.d.). How does a wind turbine generate electricity. Retrieved January 27, 2013, from Energy Self Assessment website: http://www.ruralenergy.wisc.edu/renewable/wind/default_wind.aspx
Why Wind Energy ? (2012). Retrieved January 17, 2013, from Windustry website: http://www.windustry.org/wind-basics/why-wind-energy
Wind power gets a second change. (1993, February 28). In Science encyclopedia. Retrieved January 17, 2013, from http://www.2facts.com/tsof_story.aspx?PIN=s0101350&term=wind+energy
Our world receives free energy from the sun, wind and water but within the earth an extremely hot temperature is present, which provides us with the capability to produce a lot on energy up on the surface. (Tabak 2013) The potential for utilizing this source appears to be unlimited.(Gates 2013)This is called geothermal energy and this renewable resource highly interested our group as it is becoming a reliable and eco friendly source to produce energy in this world. In our project ,we hope to achieve and prove how geothermal energy coupled with a wind turbine can lead our worlds success with a new way of using renewable resources to produce a large portion of functional energy. We will be constructing a model of a geothermal power plant to test different size of turbine blades can produce a various amount of voltage.The turbine will be attached to a generator then connecting to a voltameter through a simple circuit .As we will change mechanical energy into chemical energy by using the geothermal energy to physically power a light bulb ,when the volts are transferred through the remainder of the circuit. The different amount of volts produced will represent how much energy can be obtained in a real size turbine blade . This has a huge effect on how much energy is produced. Wind power has become much more popular as people realize its great potential ,as it will never cease to exist as it creates no pollution or burning of fossil fuels like many of the other renewable resources. (Windustry 2012) We believe that in this project we can prove and investigate more than how different turbine sizes affect how much energy is produced ,but as well as how the earths natural resources are able to power the world in a sufficient way. This project will allow us to discover a new way to power and generate a large portion of energy for our world.
Hypothesis: If different sizes of turbines(independent variable) are tested through geothermal renewable energy resources, than the larger one will create the most amount of rotations per minute(dependant variable) because the amount of power you produce is determined by the square of the rotor blade radius. Meaning that increasing the size of the turbine has an exponential effect on the power. When a wind turbine grasps the force of wind velocity with rotor blades power is creating. Since the. rotor blades are designed to accelerate airflow over once surface of the blade. the larger one will accelerate and produce the most energy .(USDA 2013)The controlled variables are the the size of the hole in the geothermal power plant , the temperature of the stove and how far away the turbine in from the model of the geothermal power plant.
Independent variable: Size of the turbine
Dependent variable: the amount of rotations per minute
Controlled variables: the temperature of the stove , how far away the turbine is from the the model of the geothermal power plant and the size of the hole in the geothermal power plant.
Materials:
· Three different sizes of a pinwheel (small, medium and large)
· Clean metal can with one lid removed, 14.5-ounces; available at any grocery store
· Hammer
· Nail, 1/8-inch diameter
· Wood ruler or thin piece of wood, 12 inches long
· Rubber bands (2)
· Medium-sized pot, 3 quarts
· Aluminum foil
· Stove top
· Permanent marker
· Timer
· Oven mitt
· Lab notebook
· Voltmeter
· Generator (from rechargeable flashlight)
· Alligator clips
· Small light bulb (1.5 volts)
· Copper wire
· Chopstick
· Straw
Procedure Part 1 making the power plant
1. Using a hammer and nail a hole is made at the edge of the lid that is still attached. Make another hole opposite the
first hole you have made. Both of the holes should be no larger should be no larger than 1/8 inch in diameter.
2. Attaching the ruler, vertically to the side of the can, using rubber bands. Position the ruler so its between the two holes. Make sure that the bottom edge of the ruler is flush with the bottom edge of the metal can. The can and the ruler shouldn’t be titled when placed on a flat surface. The open end of the can is facing down.
3. Fill your 3-quart pot with 2 quarts (or just over half full) of tap water. Take a piece of aluminum foil and place it on top of the pot. Crimp the foil down over the edges of the pot so that the water is sealed in. Take another piece of foil and place it on top of the first piece of foil. Crimp the second piece to ensure that when the water boils, no steam can get out from the edges. The foil-covered pot models the earth. The aluminum foil is the crust, covering the heat that is within the earth.
4. Gently poke a hole in the center of the aluminum foil pieces, using the nail. Make sure that the nail goes through both layers of aluminum foil. The hole should be no larger than 1/8 inch in diameter.
5. Turn the stovetop on medium to medium high and place the pot on top of the flame or hot surface. Note the setting of the stovetop in your lab notebook in a data table like the one shown below. The heat setting should be hot enough to boil water; however, make sure that the water doesn't boil so heavily that water hits the foil.
6. Make one large mark on the back of the pinwheel at the base of the spokes with the permanent marker. You want to be able to see the mark clearly while the pinwheel is spinning.
7. Wait for the water to boil. When you see steam coming out of the hole and the foil cover is slightly inflated, you are ready to start the experiment.
8. Hold the pinwheel, facing down, above the can over both holes. See Figure 4, below. Make sure that the ruler is not in the way of the pinwheel and that the pinwheel is parallel to the can's top. If necessary, push the ruler down gently so that the can doesn't move too much. The pinwheel will start spinning. Note the height at which you are holding the pinwheel. You can use the ruler to determine the height. Write any marking on one blade of the radius and count how many time it rotates in one minute using your timer.
9. Repeat step 8 with the two other sizes of turbines and record your results.
Procedure part 2 attaching the turbine to the circuit
Please note that this part of our project was unable to function as we originally planned to attach the turbine to a voltmeter to light a light bulb .Due to unforced airs, it was unable to happen. We realized we needed our turbine to be made of a stronger material to have enough energy to power the generator. When dealing with a real wind turbine and geothermal power plant we believe after researching that our original project would still be possible if we found a functional way to hook the generator up to the stronger turbine. Our altered project is listed in the steps above but here is part two of how you could create a stronger turbine to power the generator into creating electricity.
1) After the geothermal power plant model is all set up you will start connecting the circuit to begin your process of changing mechanical into chemical energy.
2) Instead of using a normal toy pinwheel as we did try making your turbine out of steel to give it some strength resulting in the ability for more power to be produced. Take your turbine and insert a straw through the middle of it.
3) Now using the generator from the rechargeable flashlight use the gear and attach it to the crank. Since the turbine is now made of steel being metal when it turns it will attract to the 4 coil magnets in the generator allowing them to spin at the same time producing energy.
4) Place two alligator clips on the stripped copper wire on the side of the generator then attach the other end of them into the voltammeter.
5) Continuing your simple circuit attach two more alligator clips to the ones in the voltameter to the small light bulb. Now your circuit is complete and you are able to conduct the experiment.
Part 3 conducting the experiment
If the experiment did work this is how we assume the experiment would take place
1) Refer back to part one step 8. Start from there when the turbine was spinning from the steam produced by the geothermal power plant ,the steel turbine would attract to the generator causing the magnets inside of it to move back and forth. Energy is created and it moves through the circuit and will need to produce at least 1.5 volts in order for the voltameter to light the light bulb.
Observations : Large turbine was slow but steady and when speed incresed it stayed going at a face pace for a long period of time
medium: sped up and slowed down many times and due to the fact it was only a toy pinwheel sometimes came to a complete stop
small turbine : Only sped up twice up to 10 seconds and was very slow for most of the time
Discussion
In our hypothesis we stated that if different sizes of turbines are tested through geothermal renewable energy resources, than the largest turbine will create the most rotations per minute. After finishing the experiment and reviewing results our predictions were proven correct. Due to the fact that the research stated that the amount of energy produced with a wind turbine is determined by square of the rotor blade radius . A bigger turbine blade allows more energy to be produced because more steam from the geothermal power plant was taken in , in comparison to the other sizes. The largest turbine had spun 101 times, the middle 61 and the smallest 54 times.
To perform our experiment we first had to put together all the individual pieces. We had to put together our power plant using a ruler, a can and rubber bands and poke holes into it using a nail, this was done so that the steam could protrude through from the boiling water underneath and spin the turbine. We next had to fill the pot 2/3 full of water, cover it with tinfoil, poke a hole in the middle and set it on the stove on medium-high. We then placed the power plant on top and waited for the water to boil. Once the water was at a boil, we held the pinwheel overtop of the power plant (making sure the pinwheel didn’t hit the ruler) and counted the amount of rotations in one minute. We repeated this three times in order to test each pinwheel, keeping in mind that the pinwheel was held at the same height each time. Our experiment was originally quite complicated with many variables that needed to be considered and look at closely.We were very precise when We intended on adding a simple circuit including a generator , voltmeter and 1.5 volt light bulb. unfortunately ,we were unable to hook up to generator to the turbine so we could transfer the energy produced by the turbine into usable electricity. We realized that as a result of the poor material choice of pinwheel it was not strong enough to power a 1.5 lightbulb. Although it seems like an obvious answer we seemed to think before researching that the smaller turbine would produce the most energy because it would be able to spin at a faster pace. Only after realizing that as the blade radius is increased a huge impact is made on energy production.When the altered experiment was conducted all the variables were considered. The controlled variables being the heat of the stove , how far away the turbine was from the geothermal power plant and the size of the whole in the geothermal power plant. The independent variable in our experiment was the size of the turbine blades and the dependant variable was the number of rotations per minute the turbine conducted.
When we used steam to rotate the pinwheel the size of turbine did indeed matter. As you can see in the graph the turbine with the largest blade had a noticeable higher amount of rotations than the other two sizes. Since the width of the blades on the largest turbine allowed it to collect more steam and rotate faster, it did more rotations out of the three. The other two were much closer in terms of rotations. The middle had spun 61 times and the smallest 54, this was predicted though as they have a smaller surface area to take up steam with. The outcome of the experiment was positive collecting the same results we had hope to originally only in a more simple way. Despite the fact that the circuit did not work our research and results still match . Leading us to believe that our background research was correct and larger turbine blades do in fact produce more energy.
Overall our experiment was successful; however, some things didn’t work exactly as planned. Our initial experiment as we explained before including the generator attached to the turbine then connected to a voltmeter to measure the volts produced per turbine. After countless attempts we were unable to get the generator working properly and attached to the turbine. This set us back a lot in our experiment as we took up most of our work classes trying to get it to work. This would be one of the only things we would change. If the turbine was made of steel it would attract to the magnets in the generator allowing it to spin and steel would also give it more strength to produce more power. Another issue we came along during our experiment was that the turbines kept falling off the chopsticks. If it hadn’t it might have changed the results we received with the medium and small turbines. If we were ever to perform the experiment again, we would definitely find a better way to measure the volts and use the generator, but we just didn’t have the time this time around, to make it work.
Conclusion
In my hypothesis I suggested that if different sizes of turbines are tested through geothermal renewable energy resources, than the larger one will create the most amount of rotations per minute because the amount of power you produce is If determined by the square of the blade radius. Meaning that increasing the size of the turbine has an exponential effect on the power. This statement was proven correct. The results stated that the larger turbine spun 101 times spinning the most out of the three because of the width of the blades, the more surface area there was the more steam it was able to collect spun the turbines faster. The other two turbines were closer together in the amount of times they spun. The medium turbine spun 61 times in one minute and the small turbine spun 54 times. All the variables were considered during this experiment. Are main objective was to hook the project up to the circuit so we could produce volts. This was unsuccessful when we tried the various amounts of times. A source of error that we had during this experiment is that the turbines fell off the chopsticks a few times, meaning that the number of rotations could have been higher if they had not. Overall are experiment was successful. If we were to conduct this experiment again I think we would use a different generator so it would be possible to collect volts. Also we would use a less flimsy turbine made from steel.
References
E, A., & Richie, D. (n.d.). Geothermal energy. In Encyclopedia of Earthquakes and Volcanoes (Third ed., p. 1). Retrieved from Facts On File: Science Online database.
Electric Devices and circuits. (n.d.). Retrieved from Facts On File: Science Online database.
Knight, J. (2004, July 31). Freedom to harvest the wind. In Science encyclopedia. Retrieved January 8, 2013, from http://www.2facts.com/tsof_story.aspx?PIN=s1201703&term=wind+turbine
National geophysical research institute, H. G. (2007). Geothermal energy an alternative resources for the 21st century. Hyderabad, India: Elsevier.
Science Online. (n.d.). Retrieved from Facts On File: Science Online database.
United states department of agriculture. (n.d.). How does a wind turbine generate electricity. Retrieved January 27, 2013, from Energy Self Assessment website: http://www.ruralenergy.wisc.edu/renewable/wind/default_wind.aspx
Why Wind Energy ? (2012). Retrieved January 17, 2013, from Windustry website: http://www.windustry.org/wind-basics/why-wind-energy
Wind power gets a second change. (1993, February 28). In Science encyclopedia. Retrieved January 17, 2013, from http://www.2facts.com/tsof_story.aspx?PIN=s0101350&term=wind+energy