Renewable Energy

Daniel Maldonado Sanchez

In our days, Puerto Rico is passing through a lot of economic problems, for example, no money for education, food or to pay the basic living things like the services of water and electricity that every day become more needed with all the technology thats coming out. We know that the resources that we use today are more expensive than ever. One of the most necessary resource for us is the electricity. As the usage of this resource becomes higher the cost also becomes higher because more oil is needed to produce it and the oil is a really expensive fuel. This resource is very important because we use it every day to study, work, eat, travel, etc. A lot of people have or have had problems with the cost of the electricity and many of them don’t have enough money to pay the high price of it. Some of the people that really don’t have the manner to find the money to support these high prices tend to steal it. However is important to know that the method of stealing it is obviously not the best and that there are many others alternatives that could be made to have this important resource without steeling it.

The renewable energy is energy that comes from natural resources that involves the use of sunlight, wind, rain and water. If we talk about the sunlight we can refer as photovoltaics. Photovoltaics is the direct conversion of light into electricity at the atomic level. The photoelectric effect that some material exhibit cause the absorb photons of light and release electrons. This occurs in the solar cells that are made of semiconductors materials such as silicon. When light strikes the cells, a portion is absorb and transfer to the semiconductor, the energy knocks electrons loose, allowing them to flow freely. When these electrons are captures, an electric current results and can be used as electricity. This solar cells can be connected in both series and parallel electrical arrangement to produce any required voltage and current combination. This use is one of the best solutions because the sun's rays give off approximately 1,000 watts of energy per square meter of the planets surface. If we collect all of that energy we could easily power our homes and offices for free.

Other renewable energy is the wind, we can use the term eolic energy. The wind energy is the energy generated by the wind and can be used directly or be transformed as electric power. It consist to use windmills for mechanical power. This method uses the kinetic energy generated by the effect of the wind. Wind energy is currently the fastest growing renewable energy and represents a large portion of the electric production.

Every time a drop of water from the rain impacts on a surface it is an opportunity missed. Each raindrop has an impact energy that is highly dependent on the size of the drop; from a small drizzle drop that has 2 microjoules on impact, to a downpour size drop that carries 1 millijoule of impact energy. A team of scientist identified that a piezoelectric material might be able to capture that energy. Piezoelectric materials generate an electrical potential when acted on by an outside physical force in this case a raindrop. They were able to capture between 1 nanojoule and 25 microjoules of energy per drop. The total power will vary incredibly depending on the conditions, but the device produces about one microwatt of power in a light drizzle. This type of device might work quite well for sensors, especially if the sensor is detecting rain. For example a weather sensor that would only send a signal of how hard it is raining, when it is in fact raining. Or how about sensors that will automatically close your house windows when a storm suddenly appears. This technology will not make up a large portion of our energy, but capturing the available energy all around us is certainly a good idea.

Another important type of renewable-energy is the water energy. Flowing water creates energy that can be captured and turned into electricity. This is called hydroelectric power or hydropower. The most common type of hydroelectric power plant uses a dam on a river to store water in a reservoir. Water released from the reservoir flows through a turbine, spinning it, which in turn activates a generator to produce electricity. But hydroelectric power doesn't necessarily require a large dam. Some hydroelectric power plants just use a small canal to channel the river water through a turbine. Another type of hydroelectric power plant, called a pumped storage plant, can even store power. The power is sent from a power grid into the electric generators. The generators then spin the turbines backward, which causes the turbines to pump water from a river or lower reservoir to an upper reservoir, where the power is stored. To use the power, the water is released from the upper reservoir back down into the river or lower reservoir. This spins the turbines forward, activating the generators to produce electricity. A small or micro-hydroelectric power system can produce enough electricity for a home, farm, or ranch.

As we can see through out all the information found the renewable energy is a method that every place of the world should be using because its very environment friendly and would contribute to a more safe and pure way of living. The use of crude oil to generate electricity is one of the main causes of Global Warming and as we said earlier renewable-energy is a very resulting way to safe the Planet. There are more ways of this type of energy but the ones that we mentioned here are the most commonly used. We have to choose if we continued to use non-renewable energy or start using renewable energy.

Reference:

Callihan, Jean. 2010. Hydropower. Taken http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/tech/hydropower the day 29 of november 2011.

Company Sun & Climate. Taken from http://www.sunandclimate.com/products/6-wind-energy.html the date 27 of november 2011.

McGee, Tim. 2008. Renewable Energy. Taken from , the http://www.treehugger.com/renewable-energy/the-power-of-rain-alternative-energy.html, the date 28 of november 2011.

Types of Renewable energy. Taken from http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/tech/home the date 29 of november 2011.