Alternative Energy

Alternative energy sources swing with the wind these days, no pun intended. (A pun is a short joke based on words). What I mean by the first sentence is that many different kinds of alternative energy sources are discovered almost daily, some by accident, many by design. In fact, the reading in our books covered a group in England who discovered cars can run on cooking oil. In middle America, small farms use cooking oil, and other forms of reusable fuel sources such as methane related products and biomass energy sources, to run equipment. Composting toilets and other compost can be used for fuel as well, after being cleaned, of course.

We have also seen other alternative energy sources of late: wave energy, foot power energy, bicycle pedal energy, wind, solar, biomass, and geothermal energy, and the list is far from over. However, which of these will stay and which will go remains a question that will long be held into the future. One thing is for sure - most of these sources are cleaner than the nasty coal we still have at hand today. I'll bet we will keep using coal into the future, even though it has many shortcomings. Let's hope not, though.

In the next class we will further our talk about alternative energy sources and you will tackle the very question that may just solve our dirty energy problem, and that is, what kind of energy sources are good and clean enough to spend time and money developing? Hey, the answer might just be with you!