Peter & Erin’s Random Learnings

• The British don’t use bars of soap. They use shower gel.
• Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, and Gloria Estefan are ubiquitous. Surprisingly, James Blunt is not.
• If someone tells you it might “chuck buckets,” bring an umbrella.
• When crossing the street, look right, look left, look up, and look down. Because, as an American, you’re never quite sure from which direction the traffic is coming.
• Advice from a British motorist: “If it feels wrong, then you’re doing it right.”
• The British generally do not wear t-shirts with writing. Americans do. Only Americans. So when dining in a nice restaurant, do not wear your Moss Mountain Project t-shirt.

More Fuel For The Fire

Today was the last day of the Energy 2007 Conference. Presentation topics included renewable energy technology and fuel. Many of the participants had left the conference early, so there was only a small group of us left. Nonetheless, many of the presentations were interesting and informative and will be particularly useful for class next year.

• An Irish scientist studied the use of geothermal heating. In Maine, this technology is currently being used in large buildings such as the Bowdoin College dormatories. However, in Maine, a deep well is drilled, and water is pumped down, warmed by the earth’s natural heat, and brought back to the surface, where it is used to heat buildings. This Irish scientist discovered a way to bury water pipes one meter beneath asphalt parking lots. The black tar raises the ground’s temperature by up to 4C. As a result, when the water arrives at the building’s heating system, less energy is required to heat the water to the desired temperature.
• One of the most important presentations that I saw was given by an Australian engineering professor. He believes strongly in problem-based learning, and he has seen the benefits of having students complete hands-on projects. Naturally, I saw the connection to expeditionary learning. His students are designing a biodiesel motorcycle. They’re responsible for all steps in the design process including arranging funding, marketing the product, designing the engine, and building the motorcycle. During next year’s expedition, I hope to communicate with this scientist and to possibly have his students become “design mentors” to King students.
• A Canadian governmental scientist gave a presentation on the harmful effects of residential woodstoves. Heating your house by wood is not a very efficient process. In fact, only 1% of Canada’s energy comes from wood. However, residential wood burning is responsible for 30% of the fine particle polution in the air. I was surprised by this information and concerned, too, since I burn at least a cord of wood each winter to offset natural gas heating costs. This Canadian scientist is designing and installing lower-polluting woodstoves.
• Another presentation was given by a Japanese high school teacher. He challenges his students to design vehicles that use Sterling engines. These engines use compressed hydrogen or helium gas; as a result, they have zero carbon emissions. In addition, he developed a modification to Sterling engines that improves their performance.

Overall, attending this conference was very beneficial. I was able to learn about new technologies and theories surrounding renewable energy. I was also able to make contacts with academics that I hope to talk with during the next school year. It was also fun to be back in the “science world,” where someone presents his/her experiment and others question, critique, and comment on the report. I was happy to see that some of the things we do in my classroom are also done by professional scientists. They always start their reports by describing the problem they hope to investigate. They then describe their methods and show graphs of the results. Finally, they describe their conclusions and propose future work on the topic.