• Question: What method of creating electricity do you believe that we should use?

    Asked by puffcheese to Amy, Grant, Martin, Shawn, Usman on 13 Mar 2013.
    • Photo: Martin Archer

      Martin Archer answered on 13 Mar 2013:

      At the moment all electricity is essentially created in the same way, by rotating magnets inside coils of wire. All the different sources of power provide the energy to turn the magnets. I would love us to be able to crack nuclear fusion, the same process that powers the Sun as the amount of energy we could potentially get out is huge. It’s very difficult though and whilst we can make fusion happen on Earth we can’t maintain it for very long and it takes a lot of energy to get it going in the first place, so at the moment we can’t use it as an energy source. But hopefully in the future.

    • Photo: Grant Kennedy

      Grant Kennedy answered on 13 Mar 2013:

      So to continue Martin’s answer, there are lots of options to get those magnets turning. One of the old fashioned that is still used burns coal to boil water, and use the steam to drive the magnets. However, doing this uses up the fossil fuel, and produces carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas. So we need to use other options too, like renewable versions. We can’t just focus on one of these, like only Solar power, since it’s dark at night and batteries are hard to make well. That means we also need other types, such as tidal, and wind power. Which methods will turn out to be the best is hard to know since they’re still being developed.

      Personally I like the idea of getting power from the oceans, where you take energy from waves or water that has come in with the tide. Tidal power comes from the moon!
      g

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