Energy bills are something no one wants to deal with. Charged your phone? $20 Heated your house? $50. It doesn’t take long for all these costs to stack up, and to leave you wishing energy was free…
But wait, it is! All energy on earth (minus nuclear power) comes from the sun, and you don’t have to pay zilch for that. It’s still free when it’s in the water cycle, still free when it generates fossil fuels; it only starts costing money when a third party is involved (a.k.a your local energy provider). So, what if there was a way to take out that middle man and harness energy directly from nature? Well, introducing the AquaGo…
For our latest science unit, our class had been tasked with building energy generators which can harness power from nature. The pictures above are of the one my partner Jamie and I created, which we call the AquaGo. It took multiple drafts (and pieces machinery falling into rivers) to make it work, but eventually we were able to create something with the impressive statistics below:
Getting to a working product was definitely a challenge. Our first model was much too large to function in the venues which we had, and there wasn’t much we could do to fix it. This lead to the creation of an entirely new design. Although this one ended up working, we could have saved so much time, effort and resources if we had spent more time discussing what would really be necessary for the project, and focusing on making that quality instead of making something of quantity.
As for our presentation, I feel it went quite well. We decided to develop a game show style activity which helped engage the audience, and simplified some of the extra work we would have been doing otherwise (an ongoing goal of mine to achieve). There were a few things that we could have improved upon however. Our teacher pointed out that I kept saying “power” in place of the word “energy”, when in fact they are two very different things. For those who may not know either, here is the difference:
We also did not present the amount of watt hours produced over a long period of time with the Solar Panel vs AquaGo comparison, which definitely took away from our machine’s selling factor. To fix this, I created the graph below:
Curricular Competencies
In order to display our learning to the best of our ability, we have been tasked with reflecting on four curricular competencies which we feel our project emulates:
As I mentioned earlier, the first model of our machine did not work. I tried to get it work for around two hours on two separate days, but nothing seemed to help. I was prepared to go out and try it again, but then I identified that the size of the machine was a source of error, and that finding a stream big enough to support it was a source of uncertainty; we might be able to find one, or we might be wasting hours looking. Due to this, I decided that the best course of action would be to evaluate our methods and try a different direction. First I evaluated our methods and experimental conditions; we were experimenting with using a different stream to test our machine in than our classmates were, and our design was quite different. I concluded it was our design that was the flaw, and then evaluated the possible different ways we could conclude the product. After speaking with Jamie, we decided that the best course of action would be to build a new design.
In class, I collaboratively worked with my partner Jamie to plan out which tasks would be delegated to whom. We both selected which would work best for our skills sets. We then began our investigations by both gathering the power data in our school’s science lab with an extra generator, and then going to do field work with the solar panels and our generator in order to further our information. Using both of these investigation methods helped us make sure that the data we were collection was reliable.
The purpose of our investigations was to find a way to cut down on the costs and environmental impact of energy production and consumption. This is a problem that affects both the locals of Vancouver, and people across the globe. Our solution is our machine, which in theory would solve both of these problems. Although in itself is just a prototype without all variables considered, hopefully it can act as a guide or an inspiration on my blog to others who are looking to find further solutions to these issues.
The learning focus of this project, although yes, had to do with energy, was also focused on using our summative knowledge of graphs. I, in total, constructed three graphs for our project (the solar panel graph has three different versions as well, putting the total up to five). In order to find the benefits our project, we used our knowledge of intercept points, variables, linear equations, slopes, etc. to analyze the graphs, as well as interpreting their representative meaning (a line on a graph isn’t just a line, it is a representation of a physical concept). I also constructed, analyzed, and interpreted a 3D model and diagrams of our machine on my iPad in order to gather the measurements and design.
Project End Mind Map
Unfortunately, my MindNode app has been cleared so I do not have access to my unit start mind map, but I have developed a unit end mind map which reflects on all of my learning:
