Society and Science

Before and After Environment With Environmental Pollution Science Fair Projects

admin — Wed, 21 May 2008 04:52:01 +0000

When designing an environmental pollution experiment try to think outside the box. Most students that develop science fair projects that deal with pollution look only at historical data or only at one set of data points. If you want to wow the science fair judges at your school, state and at national level science fairs, consider designing a before and after science fair project.

Environmental pollution science fair projects are science fair projects that looks at data from before and after a variable is introduced. Having a multipart experiment will require two sets of data to be taken, however, this extra work will make your project stand out from other students.

Did you ever hear of the Haze Monitor? Well, it is extraordinary. It measures the pollution in the atomosphere and does all the calculations for you with the push of button. With this device you can do your project over the weekend. Click on the above link to get more information.

Environmental pollution experiments can examine either outdoor pollution or indoor pollution. Because indoor pollution is found within a closed system, a building, it may be easier to control the experiment, then if you tried to set up a before and after experiment to examine outdoor pollution. Because of this, indoor pollution is going to be the more practical of the two.

The variable that you introduce to the test zone will need to interact with the pollution in that environment in some measurable way. For example, if you are experimenting with indoor pollution in your home, then you may want to introduce an air purifier to examine what type of impact it has on the number of pollution particles in your home. If you are experimenting with outdoor pollution then you will most likely need to find a situation that is primed for a change all ready.

For example, a factory may be planning to implement a new filtration system for their waste water in one week. This filtration system will be the variable. You will want to take water samples before the filtration system is installed, and then samples one week after, two weeks after, one month after and six months after the filtration system is installed to chart the difference the variable made.

If you do not have access to pollution sampling kits or pollution testing kits, you don’t have to abandon the idea of an environmental pollution science fair project. However, your approach to the project will need to be slightly different. You will need to design an observational project instead.

For another example, if you have allergies then you can start a health journal that charts how you feel during the two weeks leading up to the installation of an air filter in your home, and then chart how your health improves, stays the same or declines after the filtration system is in operation. When examining outdoor pollution, visual observation, auditory observations and olfactory observations can be made and charted.

After you have collected your two data sets, your next task is to evaluate your findings. You will want to look for specific changes that occurred after the variable was introduced. Most likely you will need to chart changes on a time line.

After your data has been evaluated and you have come to your own conclusions, your next step is to figure out where to go from here. You have two choices. You can stop researching the project after you hand in your report or finish your science fair project, or you apply what you learned to develop your next research or energy science fair projects.

Fun Alternative Energy Sources School Projects | Science Fair Project Ideas

admin — Thu, 08 May 2008 19:07:57 +0000

One of the latest trends in academics is the school project. School wide projects work by involving all the students in a single, large project. One exciting type of school project that your school can try out is the alternative energy sources school projects.

There are several reasons why a school would want to develop alternative energy sources school projects. The first reason is to take advantage of grant money being offered for the project. The second reason is to encourage kids to get involved in science. The final reason is to kick start the Science Fair Projects season. Here are some renewable energy science fair project ideas that would be extremely interesting for your school project.

The first type of school project that your school can develop is a windmill science projects. Windmill science projects make for great energy science fair projects because they can be scaled to fit the amount of space your school has to work with and how much money you have to work with. You have the option of building one large windmill or several smaller windmills. You can even have each class design and build their own windmill and then award the class with the most efficient windmill a prize.

Another type of school science project that you can work on is a solar energy project. Solar energy school projects are going to work great for schools located in the sun belt of the United States. California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and Florida schools, for example, who get the most sun each year, can even use these projects to help reduce their cooling costs.

Schools in the United States’ bread basket or ranching territory may want to forego the solar and wind projects to take advantage of their own unique renewable energy source, methane. Yes, cow manure can be used as a very effective energy source. Many dairy farms, in fact, have converted their power generators to run on methane.

Schools built near rivers can examine the energy potential of running water. However, building a hydroelectric dam is ridiculous. Instead, schools can scale down the process and simulate the large scale process of transforming water movement into electricity.

If your school uses heating oil, then consider a school wide project that explores the potentials of biofuels as a heating fuel. Ethanol, a byproduct of corn, can be a very effective energy source, and could be a cost effective alternative to fossil fuels. Some of the experiments that can completed by a school include: examining the heating efficiency of biofuels compared to fossil fuels, calculating the cost difference between using biofuels and using fossil fuels and exploring the differences in emissions produced by biofuels and fossil fuels.

The final school project that you can experiment with is an emissions reduction project. This project would start by calculating how much greenhouse gasses are emitted to keep the school running. Remember to look at school bus emissions, heating emissions and emissions produced during the generation of the school’s electricity. You may need outside help from the power company and school bus company, but this help can be accomplished through guest lectures or field trips.

Unique Windmill Science Fair Projects | Windmill Experiments

admin — Fri, 02 May 2008 07:40:56 +0000

Science class curriculum is usually based on learning science facts, concepts and theories. However, it seems like few curriculum writers focus on applying science concepts to things that matter to kids. If you are a teacher looking for a way to help your students see how renewable energy can be applied to their lives then try these projects that can be found at renewable energy education in the classroom.

Before windmill science fair projects can be completed, you first need to introduce students to the concept of renewable energy, and to the concept of wind power. You will also want to discuss how a windmill works and how it generates power. You can also discuss various applications of the windmill, its history and other windmill facts.

If you have a working windmill in your area, then this is the perfect time for a field trip. It will give you students an opportunity to talk with the owner and see how he uses it as an energy resource. Then you kids can get ideas on how to do energy science fair projects. (By the way, the PicoTurbine Windmill is a perfect science kit to help the children to have a hands-on experience in experimenting with renewable resources.)

After your students are familiar with the workings of a windmill, your next step is to introduce them to questions that need to be answered. These questions need to link windmill power with a problem that students can relate to.

After your students are familiar with the workings of a windmill, your next step is to introduce them to questions that need to be answered. These questions need to link windmill power with a problem that students can relate to.

The first question you can ask your students to solve is to determine if your local weather patterns are right for generating electricity via wind power. This question will require students to conduct outside research. They can talk to people at the local weather observatory, they can look up information about wind velocities online or they can interview a local scientist or meteorologist. You may even want to bring in the local meteorologist from your local TV station as a guest speaker.

The next question that you can ask your students to solve is if wind power is the best alternative energy source for your area. To answer this question your students will need to compare wind energy efficiency and potential energy generation to that offered by solar energy. Other renewable energy sources like ocean energy, hydro energy and geothermal energy can also be examined.

The third question that you can have your students solve is how large of a windmill is required to generated enough energy to power my computer, TV or PlayStation? This question will require students to first calculate how much energy is needed to run the item in the problem, then determine how much power is generated by each size of windmill turbine, and then determine the final answer. This can be a fun weekend project for kids at home as well.

As your students become more familiar with windmills and renewable energy, your questions can become more complicated. For example, you can have them determine if a windmill can produce enough power to run your home on, your school on, your city on and your home on. These problems will require your students to conduct multi-part research. They may need to talk to people at the power company, they may need to enlist the help of the local university or they may even need to talk the state’s department of energy.

In addition to having your students solve problems for fairly straight forward questions, you can also design more abstract problems for your students to work on. To find inspiration for these problems, look for news items related to energy consumption or deficits in your local area or in your state. These kind of extra tough questions can be a great way to inspire a cool science fair projects or extra credit projects.

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