Power San Marin

Objective:

Using knowledge we gained from a field trip to Stone Edge Farm, create a possible microgrid that could power San Marin and allow it to be self sufficient.

Evidence

Electromagnet Lab

To begin to understand the concept of electricity, we conducted an electromagnet lab using wires, batteries, a nail, and paper clips.

Microgrid

That lab however was a small lead up to our bigger project, creating a hypothetical micro grid to power San Marin. The energy sources were things such as solar, wind, and hydrogen in order to deplete San Marin's reliance on PG&E electricity.

Content

  • V=ir - Voltage is equal to current multiplied by resistance. This equation can be used to find any of the values when the other two are given. The current is the flow of electricity the battery has, the resistance is the force against the current in the circuit, and voltage is the potential force of the energy source.
  • Magnets are formed when electricity loops around a ferromagnet and creates an electromagnet field which attracts other magnetic things, only when connected to a power source.

Reflection

This was one of our hardest projects because it was so open ended and there wasn't a very clear standard. My group and I decided that we would rely mainly on solar power which seemed like a good idea until we realized that during winter solar power is basically useless. So I decided to begin looking into alternate power sources and I discovered fuel cells powered by hydrogen. The way hydrogen fuel cells work is that they are attached to a hydrogen generator which produces the hydrogen from water which is then charged with energy in the hydrogen fuel cell that then creates water to be reused in an endless cycle. We then focused on that idea and began in depth research about how to make fuel cells our main energy supplier. However it was out of our realm and required a little more than just a simple Google search. It was nearly impossible to find the cost of the fuel cells or how many we needed because they were sold in "stacks" which didn't specify how many were in each stack. A lot of information was unclear and we had no background knowledge on the information or idea where to find it. However we tried our best, while one tried to find the cost of production, another focused on the number needed to power the school, and I focused on how the systems worked. I believe our collaboration allowed for us to find a lot of cohesive information that formed the beginning of an idea, however we were still unclear on what our actual idea was, everything was just an estimate. We came to what we believed was an accurate conclusion, but was speculated to be 1/4 of the cost in actuality. However our persistence in trying to come to a precise cost estimate was an excellent demonstration of critical thinking.