Energy comparison: Hydroelectricity

Hello everyone,

Welcome back to another energy comparison post. Today we're talking about hydroelectricity. This is basically just using the power of moving water for our own uses. This idea has been around for thousands of years. The ancient Greeks and Romans used watermills to grind grains for making bread. Watermills were used up until the Industrial Revolution.

What is hydroelectricity?

There are three types of hydroelectric power plants. Impoundment facilities are the most common. The water is stored in a pool or reservoir normally located at a higher elevation. The dam uses gates or valves to control the water flow. When there is demand for electricity, the water is released. It falls downwards and turns turbines that turn the kinetic energy of the water (movement energy) into electric energy. Diversion facilities don't have a dam. They channel the water towards the turbines using a system of canals. Pumped-storage facilities are powered by other renewables. They pump water into an elavated pool using these renewables. When there is demand for electricity, this water is released and moves turbines to generate electricity. They basically store the power from renewables.

Advantages

Hydroelectricity is often used in rural areas as it provides affordable energy. They power hospitals, offices, schools and homes consistantly as they are not dependant on the weather as solar and wind energy are. This is similar to coal, but obvisiously coal is not renewable. Another benefit is that it can be produced pretty much anywhere that there are rivers. This means that entire countries aren't reliant on other countries just for a basic electricity supply. It is also a major employer of multiple fields from engineers and construction workers to physicists and ecologists.

Disadvantages

Dams are a major obstacle for migrating fish such as salmon. The dams also flood the river banks to create a reservoir, destroying habitats and relocating entire settlements. There is also a build up of silt in the reservoir. This slit is all the sand and minerals that flow in from the river and would normally flow out into the sea. But they can't get through the dams. Vast amounts of money have to be spent to prevent the build up of silt.

Hydroelectricity is a controversal topic and both sides of the argument are understandable. Today 71% of the world's renewable energy comes from hydropower. Globally, China produces the most hydroelectricity.

Your Green World Blog Team💚

Sources:
https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/hydroelectric-energy/
https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/hydroelectric-energy-power-running-water/
https://www.energy.gov/eere/water/benefits-hydropower

Images:

Title image: This image is owned by a blog editor.
Cheoah Dam, Tapoco, NC, owned by Warren LeMay (on flickr.com), is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
Triadelphia Reservoir, owned by Ben Schumin (on flickr.com), is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Comments

Announcement: Animal of the week

The life of ... an alcon blue butterfly

Hi everyone, Today we are going to be looking into the life of an alcon blue butterfly (Phengaris alcon). After mating, the females lay their eggs on marsh gentian, a blue-coloured wildflower. The eggs can only be laid on these flowers, as this is what the newly hatched caterpillars will eat. Although in some alp regions, they can also be found on willow gentians, a close relative of the marsh gentian. Once the caterpillars have hatched from the eggs, their main predator and danger are the ants that swarm below. But high on their plant homes, the caterpillars are safe. However, this isn't where the alcon blue caterpillars are going to stay forever. Eventually, they drop down to the ground using silk strings. With no protection, they are soon dragged off by the ants. The most amazing part is, the alcon blue caterpillars give off the same scent and chemicals as the ant larvae. So the ants take the caterpillars back to their brood chamber, wher...

19.07.2020: Animal of the week: Honey Bees

Hi everyone, This week's animal is the honey bee. Enjoy! General Information An average honeybee hive is made up of one queen, hundreds of male drones and thousands of female workers. If the queen bee dies then a new queen is created. The workers select a young larva and feed it with a special food called ‘royal jelly’. The ‘royal jelly’ makes the larva grow into a fertile queen. Queens live for several years but the workers only live for five or six weeks. An average worker will make a twelfth of a tee spoon of honey during her entire life. Drones are turned out of the hive and left to die in Autumn. In the summer months, the queen bee is very busy, she can lay up to 2500 eggs in a single day. How they affect the world around them Honey bees are very important for flowers, fruit and vegetables. This comes from the fact that they are pollinators. They help the plants by transferring pollen between male and female parts, meaning the plants can g...

Ozone layer

Hi everyone, What even is ozone? And the ozone layer? Where does the hole in the ozone layer come from and what does it mean? Is it dangerous? What can be done? Often the ozone-talk can be complicated and confusing, keeping an overview is hard and understanding all the problems always difficult. Let us break it down a bit for you: What is the ozone layer? We'll start with the basics: The ozone layer is part of the stratosphere, which is the second layer of the Earth's atmosphere, between 10 and 50 km above the Earth's surface and made up of protective gases. One of these protective gases is ozone. There is not much ozone in the atmosphere, only 0.3 molecule of ozone per 1 million molecules of air. This is because ozone is chemically unstable and only forms when ultra violet radiation (UV light) hits oxygen and breaks the bonds between the atoms. It fact it is so unstable that even when it has formed, it breaks down again relatively quickly. This leads to ozone turning back ...

New IPCC Report 2022

Hi everyone, You've probably heard about the new IPCC report that was released earlier this year. In this post, we wanted to talk about what it is and how it could affect us. We haven't read the whole 3000+ page document, surprisingly, but people on the internet have so we have used information from reliable sources, including the IPCC website. What is the IPCC? IPCC stands for Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. It is governments and scientists from all over the world work together to produce reports about the effects of climate change. When did that new report come out? 4th April 2022 What does the new report say and what does it mean for us? The report states that average annual global greenhouse gas emissions were at their highest levels in human history between 2010 to 2019, but the rate of growth of emissions has since slowed. Emissions must peak by 2025 and then must fall drastically (43% by 2030) if we are to limit the d...

November Top Tips | sustainable activities and hobbies

Hello everyone, So this week, we are going to be talking about sustainable free time activities. This area can quite big when it comes to environmental impact, so here are some things that you can do in your free time, that are more sustainable. 1. Reading So reading is one of our favourite things to do. However, books are made of paper and the paper industry isn't great. Some ways you can get around this is by reading online (for example, on a kindle), or through borrowing books from a library or using book boxes. If there aren't any in your area then at least try to support independent bookshops! 2. Running If you love being active then this one is for you. Running is probably one of the most sustainable forms of sport. All you need are some running shoes and somewhere to run. There is obviously more high-tech gear but that isn't really necessary if it's just a hobby. 3. Gardening If you've got a small area of land o...

2021: How Our Year Went, Favourite Posts and Some Goals For 2022 | a wrap up

Hi Everyone! Today we wanted to share some thoughts on how our blogging year went in 2021 and some goals for 2022. We are now at the end of January, which is very scary, but we hope you will still enjoy this slightly belated wrap-up. In 2021, we published 36 posts in total. This is pretty good, we posted on average roughly every 10 days. However, there was a lot of time when we didn't post at all and our posts became increasingly just the monthly fact file. Many of you enjoyed the fact file, and for the most part, we enjoyed writing it but it became a bit of a chore by the end, hence the change we have made over to top tips. We think it would be nice to change our monthly post every year, and we will of course involve you in that just as we did this year. Our best posting months were by far August and September, which is understandable because we were on holiday for August and could schedule a lot of posts for September! Something we want to wor...

10 Animals on the Edge of Extinction No. 10- The Javan Rhino

The Javan rhino is listed as the 1st animal on WWF’s list of the 10 world’s most endangered animals, and I for my part, had never heard of it! If you hadn’t either, we’re changing that now. A bit about the rhino’s lifestyle The Javan rhinos are now exclusively found on the island of Java in Indonesia, but were once found in vast regions of northeast india and Southeast Asia. They have a dark grey colour which looks almost black when wet, and their (often pink) skin folds look a bit like plated armor. Both males and females have lower incisors which resemble tusks that they use to fight. Males have one relatively short horn of about 25 cm (10 inches). Javan Rhinos live in tropical forests, marshy areas and in the thick bush. They are mainly browsers and eat over 100 plants species they find in the forest, weigh between 900 and 2300 kg (1984-5071 pounds) and are between 3 and 3.2 meters (10- 10.5 feet) long. How endangered are we talking? Javan rhinos are the most ...

March 2021 Factfile - some news from the past month, animals that YOU voted for and more!

Hi Everyone! We hope you are all okay and will enjoy this month's wrap up post. We have managed to post a little more this month but we are off school soon so we may be able to post more! News! Recent European droughts and heatwaves are said to be worst in 2000 years The British newspaper, 'The Guardian' reports that the series of droughts and heatwaves since 2014 have been the worst in 2000 years. These heatwaves have disastrous consequences such as early deaths, crop failure and forest fires. For more information, click here . This is definitely the final bit of proof that climate change exists and that it needs to be stopped! Rise in deforestation in 2020 A horrifying 42 000 squared km of forest was chopped down in 2020, making it the third worst year since 2002. The most affected areas were humid tropical forests such as the Amazon, the Congo and other forests in South America and South-East Asia. These forests a...

How much do you know about big cats? - Quiz

Hello, Lions, tigers, jaguars , cheetahs , leopards - all of these amazing big cats derserve their own quiz, but seeing as we only do one quiz a month, we've had to put them all into one! Questions How old do tigers get in the wild? a) 20 years old b) 30 years old c) 40 years old True or False? The only big cats found in the Americas (in the wild) are jaguars. What is a cheetah's top speed? a) 90km/h b) 100km/h c) 110km/h True of False? A lions roar can be heard from 8km away. Leopards have been around for a long time. How old are the oldest leopard fossils ever found? a) 600 000 years old b) 700 000 years old c) 800 000 years old True or False? In Africa, cheetahs are the most endangered big cats. How heavy can jaguars get? a) 80 kg b) 110kg c) 140kg True or False? All females lions in a pride are related. ...

Green World

Search This Blog