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How can you generate environmentally friendly electricity? How does a fuel cell work and how can it be used to produce hydrogen? Renewable energies will be our most important sources of energy in the future. The generation, storage and use of electricity from the natural energy sources of water, wind and sun are clearly explained using nine models and 28 experiments. The powerful solar modules with many mounting options enable flexible use in the models. The included gold cap serves as an energy storage device and can release energy fed into the grid. The fuel cell is used to clearly illustrate how water is split into the two components hydrogen and oxygen. In this way, the principle of future forms of energy is learned and important skills are trained. With the comprehensive lesson plans, the STEM Renewable Energies can be used optimally in the classroom.
Hydropower
Hydropower is certainly one of the oldest utilised energy sources. As early as 3500 years ago, the energy of water was utilised in Mesopotamia with the help of water wheels. It was a long way from the water wheel to the turbine. The engineering skills of the Age of Enlightenment led to improvements in water wheels and ultimately to the construction of new types of machines, such as water column machines. In 1824, Claude Burdin finally invented the first turbine on this basis. When Werner von Siemens invented the electrodynamic generator in 1866, it became possible to convert water power into electricity. In 1880, the first hydroelectric power station was put into operation in Northumberland, England. In 1890, the first German hydropower plant, which was also the first alternating current power plant, was connected to the grid in Bad Reichenhall and in 1896, the world's first large-scale power plant was built at Niagara Falls in the USA.
Wind power
With the advent of electricity at the end of the 19th century, the first attempts were made to generate electricity with wind turbines based on windmill technology. In the 1950s, engineer J. Juul became a pioneer when he built the world's first wind turbine to generate alternating current in Vester Egesborg. The innovative Gedser wind turbine with an output of 200 kW was built in 1956-57 by J. Juul for the electricity company SEAS on the coast of Gedser in southern Denmark. In 1987, Germany's first wind farm was built on the Growian site near Marne.
Photovoltaics
The photovoltaic effect was discovered by Alexandre Edmond Becquerel in 1839, marking the beginning of the history of photovoltaics. However, it was over a hundred years before it was utilised in the energy supply.The first explanation of the photoelectric effect was provided by Albert Einstein in 1904. Prior to this, Edmond Becquerel had provided evidence of a connection between light and energy generation, but initially no benefit could be derived from this discovery. In 1954, physicists Chapin, Fuller and Pearson succeeded in building the world's first version of a silicon solar cell. This was the starting signal for the use of crystalline solar cells to convert sunlight into electrical energy. The first 108 photovoltaic cells were used on the mission of the US satellite Vanguard in 1958.
However, it would be another 20 years before terrestrial systems were installed. In 1976, the Australian government decided to equip the telecommunications network in the outback with solar cells to charge the batteries installed there. In the mid-1980s, the Swiss engineer Markus Real persuaded people to install small decentralised photovoltaic systems on the roofs of houses in order to demonstrate private implementation. Numerous large-scale solar projects were subsequently launched, such as the 1,000 Roofs Programme in Germany (1990) and the 70,000 Roofs Programme in Japan (1994). In 2010, the ten gigawatt mark was exceeded in Germany and by 2012 the figure had already reached 25 gigawatts. By the end of 2019, over 49 GW had been installed in Germany.
With the signing of the nuclear phase-out by the energy industry and the German government on 11 June 2001, the so-called energy transition, the conversion of the energy system to a sustainable energy supply with the help of renewable energies, moved to the forefront of social perception, current research and technological development.
The fischertechnik learning construction set Renewable Energies deals with the central issues of energy conversion through power converters, energy transmission and energy storage of renewable energy sources. The various models for wind power, hydropower and photovoltaics invite you to experiment and explore and address current issues in science and physics.
The following fischertechnik components are used for the work on renewable energies:
Of course, all of this fits perfectly into the fischertechnik system, so that not only the basic problems of renewable energies are represented, but realistic functional models can also be operated.
