Botkin & Keller: Environmental Science: Earth as a Living Planet- 8th Ed.

Guided Reading: Chapter 16: Alternative Energy and The Environment

Name: _______________________________________________________
Read: Using Wind Power in New Ways for an Old Application
1: How was the voyage of the Beluga SkySails different than traditional industrial ship voyages?
Using kites instead of sails
Introduction to Alternative Energy Sources
2: Fossil fuels supply approximately __90____% of the energy consumed by people
3: What are the two types of non-renewable alternative energy sources? Why are they
considered to be non-renewable?
Nuclear energy = requires mineral fuel
Gothermal energy = heat can be extracted from earth faster than it is naturally replenish
4: What is low-density, near-surface geothermal energy?
Solar energy stored by soil and rock near the surface
5: What are biofuels made from?
biomass
6: What is the definition of renewable energy?
Resources that replenish fast
Solar Energy
7: How much solar energy is equal to the energy stored in a all known reserves of coal, oil and
natural gas on Earth?
90,000 teawatts
8: What are passive solar energy systems? Give an example.
Architecture design to enhance the absorption of solar energy facing window south winter warm
summer-cool
9: What are active solar energy systems? Give an example.
Mechanical power to locate where the heat is stored and then pumped to where the energy is used

10: What are solar collectors? What are they used for? How do they work?
Provide space heating or hot water are usually flat glass concentrate to the heating metal.
11: What are photovoltaics? What are they made out of? Explain how they work.
Solar panels = solar cells silicon and other materials
Sunlight strike cells to produce electric current

12: What are solar thermal generators? How do they work?
Focus sunlight into a tower that has water or oil using mirrors.
13: What are some of the environmental concerns of solar energy?
Resources metals, glass, plastics, fluids
Production accidental toxic materials
14: What are fuel cells? How are they created?
Highly efficient power- generating systems that produce electricity by combining fuel and oxygen in
electrochemical reaction
Water Power
15: Water power has been around since when?
18
th
century
16: How much power in the United States is currently powered by hydroelectricity?
10 %
17: What is microhydropower? Where is this helpful?
Small scale hydropower
Individual homes, farms, small industries
18: What are the environmental benefits of hydroelectricity?
Reduce bills
19: What are the environmental consequences of hydroelectricity?
Blocks fish passage
Changes flows
Ocean Energy
20: Explain how we can harness tidal power.
Mills dam bui
21: What are some of the environmental impacts of tidal power?
Flow of nutrients
Disturb fish
Wind Power
22: What is the major problem with using wind power?
Kill migratory bird and degrade an areas scenery
23: How are winds produced?
Defferential heating of earths surface creates all masses with differing conts and densities
24: How does topography influence winds? Explain.
Velocity of the wind because of the hilltop
25: Which regions in the United States have the greatest potential for wind power
development?
North Carolina south carolina
26: Which country has the largest wind energy capacity installed?
U.S.A
27: Modern wind turbines are big- as much as __70____ m high, as tall as a _23____ story
building, and have a generating capacity of more than _1million_____ watts. This is enough
electricity for ___500____ modern U.S. homes.
28: What are the disadvantages to wind power for the environment?
Kill mignatory birds
29: What is the future outlook for wind energy generation?
Can supply 10% of energy use
Biofuels
30: What are the 3 categories of biofuels?
Firewood, organic wastes and crops
31: How many people worldwide still use wood as their primary source for energy?
More than 1 billion people
32: What are some of the benefits of using biofuels?
Neutral the CO2 emmissions
33: What are the environmental concerns with the using of biofuels?
It is taking place of human edible crops
Geothermal Energy
34: What are the two types of geothermal energy and how do they differ?
Deep-earth high density make use of energy within the earth
Shallow earth low-density solar energy warms the surface
35: How many people worldwide depend on geothermal as their energy source?
40 million people
36: What type of location is ideal for high-density geothermal energy? Give an example.
Boise, Idaho = circulation of stem / hot water transfers heat from the earth.
37: Where is low-density geothermal energy mostly found? Why?
Iceland depths to the surface lower temperature
38: What are the PROS and CONS of using geothermal energy?
Pros cheap and huge 90% less CO2 and sulf
Cons- onsite noise, emissions of gas
39: What types of government incentives might encourage use of alternative energy sources?
Subsides the companies that use alternative energy sources
Put heavy taxes on people that use coal
Economic- will be better
Environment less population
Would their widespread use affect our economic and social environment? Chapter #17- Nuclear Energy
and the Environment
1: How much of the worlds electricity do nuclear power plant provide?
17%
2: In the United States, nuclear power plants produce about ____% of the countrys
electricity and about _20____% of the total energy used.
3: The nuclear power plants in France provide __78___% of the countrys total energy.
What is Nuclear Energy?
4: What is nuclear energy?
Energy contained in atoms nucleus
5: What is the difference between fission and fusion?
Fission splitting atomic nuclei fusion combining atomic world
6: Nuclear reactors use _fission________ (fusion or fission?) and which product as a source of
radioactivity? _Uranium oxide___________________
7: Which type of Uranium is used for nuclear power plants?
Uranium - 235
8: What does it mean that the Uranium is enriched?
Concentration 0.7% - 3 % = fuel
9: What is a nuclear meltdown?
Accident in which coolant system fails and nuclear plant is so hot and make a hole and contaminate the
environment with radio-activity
10: Reactors that use ordinary water as the coolant are called: ____light water reactor_______________
11: Draw and label a diagram below to explain the nuclear power plant set-up: A Closer Look:
Radioactive Decay
12: What is a radioisotope?
Chemical element that spontaneously undergoes radioactive decay
13: What is radioactive decay?
Radioisotope changes from one isotope to the other
14: What is a half-life? What is the half-life of Uranium 235?
The time where the isotope to decay to another form
15: Define the following types of nuclear radiation: (Explain the safety measures needed when
using each)
* Alpha Particle:
Can travel in bold 0.005 0.008 cm ( 0.002 0.003 in.) block by ssheet of paper
*Beta Particle:
Particles travel faster though air than alpha particles block by aluminium foil or block of wood
* Gamma Rays:
Travel longest more energetic than x-rays
Protection meter of concrete or several cm of lead
16: Uranium goes through a radioactive decay chain to finally become which element?
Lead - 206
Nuclear Energy and the Environment
17: What are the major problems associated with the nuclear fuel cycle?
Produce radioactive waste
Expose to worker and locals
Hazardous waste on site
Nuclear Radiation in the Environment, and its Effects on Human Health
18: How does nuclear radiation effect ecosystems? Explain and give an example.
Enter the food web
Reindeer moss- lichen that is a primary winter food of the caribou
19: Radiation is found naturally in what kind of materials? Give 2 examples.
Rock, radon gas
soil
20: Where in the United States are background radiation levels higher?
Next to nuclear plants
21: In what ways are people exposed to radiation in their every day lives?
From the sun
A Closer Look: Radiation Units and Doses
22: What is the commonly used unit for radioactive decay? Who is it named after?
Curic Ci Marie Curi
23: What is the SI unit for radioactive decay?
Bq = becquerrel
24: When dealing with the environmental effects of radiation, we are most interested in the
actual dose of radiation delivered by radioactivity. This dose is commonly measured in
terms of __rads (rd)___ and __rems____. In the international system (SI), the units are _grays (Gy)_____
and
__sieverts (sv)______.
25: For gamma rays, the unit commonly used is the __roentgen__________ or in SI units, ___coulombs
per kilogram c/kg________
26: What is the LD50 dose of radiation in humans?
1000 200 msr
27: What happened to the women who worked in the watch factories in the early 1900s?
Jaw rot because they lick the paint brush
The paint contained radium

28: What are the health effects for workers in uranium mines? Nuclear Power Plant Accidents
Lung cancer
29: What is the current risk of a nuclear meltdown in the U.S. according to the U.S. Nuclear
Regulatory Commission?
No greater than 0.01% - one chance in 10,000
Three-Mile Island
30: When did the event on Three-Mile Island occur?
March 28,1979
31: Where is Three-Mile Island located?
Harrisburg, Pennyslavania
32: What were some of the societal issues associated with the incident at Three-Mile Island?
That is was safe before
Chernobyl
33: Summarize the events at Chernobyl, Soviet Union
Nuclear power plant accident
leaks
34: How many people died and how many people were diagnosed with acute radiation
sickness?
4,000 16,000 39,000
35: How many people were exposed to radiation in the days following the accident?
40,000
36: What was the most common type of illness that resulted from the Japanese A-bomb
survivors?
leukemia
37: What was the most common type of illness that resulted from the Chernobyl accident?
Thyroid cancer
38: What happened to the ecosystem around the affected area following the meltdown?
Hazard to biotic
Hard to live
Radioactive-Waste Management
39: What is low-level radioactive waste? Where it is stored?
Low concentration or quantities that it does not present a significant env. hazard if properly handled
40: What is transuranic waste? How is it created?
Waste contaminated by man-made radioactive element
41: What is high-level radioactive waste? Where is it stored?
Commercials and military spent nuclear fuel
42: What and where is Yucca Mountain? What was the plan with it?
YUCCA Mountain is found in Nevada. It is going to be used for a site in a nuclear waste
43: What are the safety hazards associated with using Yucca Mountain to store nuclear waste?
Terroist might steal it
The transportation there might be an accident.
The nuclear sites are indifferent sites.
The Future of Nuclear Energy
44: How much Uranium stores do we have left?
Last until 85 year
45: What are the PROS and CONS of using Nuclear Power?
Pros cleaner emissions
Cons hazardous water
46: What are breeder reactors?
Produce new nuclear fuel by transforming waste or lower-grade uranium into fissionable material.