Unpacked Content
Scientific and Engineering Practices
Analyzing and Interpreting Data
Crosscutting Concepts
Cause and Effect
Knowledge
Students know:
- Examples of renewable energy sources and nonrenewable energy sources, and the uses of each.
- The origin of different types of nonrenewable energy sources.
- How various types of renewable and nonrenewable energy sources are harvested, how harvesting may impact the surrounding environment, and how to reduce any negative impacts of harvesting these resources.
- How various types of renewable and nonrenewable energy sources are used, how using them may impact the environment, and how to reduce any negative impacts of using these resources.
- The sustainability of human societies and environmental biodiversity require responsible management of natural resources, including renewable and nonrenewable energy sources.
Skills
Students are able to:
- Identify various types of energy resources.
- Explain how various nonrenewable and renewable resources are used to provide energy.
- Analyze geographical data to ascertain resource availability and sustainability.
- Evaluate environmental strategies that promote energy resource sustainability.
- Design and/or refine a solution to mitigate negative impacts of using nonrenewable and renewable energy sources, or evaluate available design solutions based on scientific principles, empirical evidence, and logical arguments.
Understanding
Students understand that:
- All forms of energy production and resource extraction have associated economic, social, environmental, and geopolitical benefits as well as costs and risks.
- Scientific knowledge indicates what can happen in natural systems, not what should happen. What should happen involves ethics, values, and human decisions about the use of existing knowledge.
- Environmental feedback, whether negative or positive, can stabilize or destabilize a system.
- It is important to consider a range of constraints, including cost, safety, reliability, and aesthetics, and to take into account social, cultural, and environmental impacts when developing and/or evaluating solutions.
Vocabulary
- renewable resource
- nonrenewable resource
- consumption rate
- sustainability
- environmental policy
- conservation (Law of Conservation of Energy)
- 3 R's = reduce, reuse, recycle
- fossil fuels
- pollution
- energy efficiency
- resource extraction and harnessing
- alternative energy
- waste
- mining
- reclamation
- remediation
- mitigation
- biomass
- hydroelectric
- geothermal
- nuclear energy
- natural gas
- wind turbine
- solar power
- hybrid
- hydrogen fuel cell
