Blogs
There are many issues that we are facing today. We depend on fossil fuels for almost everything in our daily lives, and we aren’t looking at the alternatives in a fast or effective manner. As a country we should be taking the initiative and becoming leaders to others toward a greener planet. One way we can have an effect is by changing where we get our energy. In Alberta we heavily rely on coal and natural gas for our power. We want to move towards other more efficient and less harmful resources. In Alberta we generate 38% of our energy from coal and 39% from natural gas. We would like to change that. We are looking into the effects of renewable energy such as wind or solar power and how they are healthier alternatives as an energy source. We are looking into local organizations which are interested in becoming more sustainable, like Echo Haven, a local community with zero net homes, meaning they are generating as much energy as they consume and are completely sustainable having an 80% reduction of grid power compared to the average home in Calgary. There are 464,000 houses in calgary alone if calgary was able to become sustainable like eco haven we would see a massive change in carbon emissions in Alberta. As a country we should be working towards this so that we can help make a change in the world. “If there are no clouds in the way, then one square meter of the earth will receive about one kilowatt of that energy. So for the six hours in the middle of a sunny day, an area the size of a small backyard swimming pool (48 m2) will receive about 288 kilowatts of energy. That’s nearly 10 times what the average US household uses in an entire day! (In the United States, the average daily electricity use is around 30 kilowatt hours per household).” If we were able to collect that amount of energy we wouldn’t need coal or natural gas on sunny days. We as a school will be doing our best to conserve energy by turning off our lights and using less energy.
Kendra W. and Ryan M.
