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Trevor Moody

Mrs. Trotter

English Comp. II

24 March 2019

Renewable Energy

Growing up in all of my science class, I was always told the same thing. As I’m older it’s

something I find more and more common in different school systems. We are all told that

renewable energy is something that would help save the air and can be just as efficient as using

fossil fuel. In a growing field, it seems like nothing has really changed. Driving around Dayton

we see the air around us slowly getting more and more polluted, and in other place in the United

States it is worst then what it is here. We can see in China and Japan having to wear mask’s

around because the air is not good to breathe. Eco-friendly communities were something I never

thought in the line of wondering how to help fix this. While in Europe, cities are already

switching over to mostly renewable energy.

Being almost twenty, a question that came to mind, what would a community look like if

they switched to all renewable energy? In answering this question, we will be looking at four

things; How would an eco-friendly community look like and how effective would it be, what are

we mostly using renewable energy for today, what are the benefits of pushing and using eco-

friendly communities, and what are problems/downfalls of eco-friendly communities.

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When looking at eco-friendly communities, there are already a few big companies

bringing a push on this. Some being the car companies, like Tesla, are bringing electric cars onto

the market. According to the Department of Energy, electric cars can be charged at home, work,

or on the road. Electric can be powered by using renewable energy, while gas is a dependent fuel

that doesn’t come naturally here in the United States (Energy, United States Department of

Energy & Renewable). I bring cars into this because cars are something, we are all very

dependent on. Just about everyone has a car and or drives. While this seems like common

knowledge, what most people don’t know, transportation make up about twenty-seven percent of

greenhouse emissions (EPA). While this is a little more than a quarter of it, switching to buying

an electric car, which is cheaper, can help eliminate about one-fourth of greenhouse emissions

from the earth. As someone who also loves the thrill of the speed, we don’t have to worry about

boring small electric cars. Tesla has been coming out with some of the top edge electric cars.

Being some of the fastest electric cars, they soon have plans to even have an electric truck

model. As electric cars advance more and more, I am sure we will see other companies take this

model. Bringing cheaper and more better cars either it be trucks or different models like the

Tesla.

So how do electric cars help? According to the Department of energy, electric cars don’t

produce any greenhouse emissions since they do not have a tailpipe to release any used fuel.

While conventional cars do. (Energy, United States Department of Energy & Renewable).

Another way it can help is it can save you money. Electric cars are cheaper, not just to make but

the price is cheaper to buy. They will save you money in the long run by the recharging being

cheaper then filling a car with gas. With this being a big move towards being an eco-friendly

community, what else would the eco-friendly look like that would help the environment?
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While thinking about eco-friendly communities, a big part of what we think about is what

will our houses be and how will they look? I think we all seen the giant ugly looking solar panels

on the houses. While yes this is one way, we can get solar energy to our house, it is not the most

pleasing to the eye. Luckily, this isn’t the only way to power our home. While not every home

can be powered the same, there is a few ways based from where you live. A big popular one that

just about everyone thinks about is solar panels. This is an easy one, because it something no

matter where you live, you can own one. A few others would be water powered. New technology

is being able to turn running water into energy. Not the giant watermills (Which I think is what

we all first think of) but micro hydro systems that can power the home. Another is windmills,

while expensive, they’re strong and durable and can power many houses. And finally, another

way is by hybrids systems. They combined both solar and wind energy to optimize the energy to

your home. These are just a few of the ways a home can mostly be singularly powered. Another

way is by a solar grid. A big set of solar panels that power a community of houses. This is good

because living in different parts of the world has a better way of powering houses. Houses on a

river or stream might find hydro power better then solar power. While Midwest people may

enjoy solar panels better due to open space and direct sunlight. While personal in which to

choose, there is different options to power your home.

A new cool way Tesla is making solar panels more pleasing is by making solar roofing.

Instead of standard shingles, its mini nice-looking solar shingles instead. Making the house have

a nice sleek design while also powering the whole house. They bring an extra wall battery that

stores any extra energy. Tesla is currently a lead designer in renewable energy, making solar
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panels nice on houses, fast and fuel-efficient cars, and being able to charge and have an extra

battery pack to keep in your house.

When looking at what the future could look at, we need to finally look at how factories

and business would look like if ran on solar energy. Factories and manufactures business make

up more than 50% of the pollution in the air (Leonardo). According to Cleaner + Greener, this is

because it takes a lot of fossil fuels to make and deliver the goods that we buy every day. So, if

we were able to switch the factories business places all to eco-friendly, how would it look? Some

companies are already taking this stand. Some popular ones being IKEA, Patagonia, and even

Nike is starting to step up. IKEA is making sure not only is the stores eco-friendlier, but where

they get their supplies too. IKEA is a popular furniture store that has kept and gained more

popularity. IKEA uses a special way to turn its company to an eco-friendly business while still

providing great quality goods. IKEA uses 750,000 solar panels to power their stores and have

been in the works of one day even selling them to consumers too. They even use offsite and own

and operate 416 wind turbines (IKEA).

This business model is something many other factories could move and push too. While

expensive at first, they’re cheaper to operate and long term save money. If we were to push for

factories to also power using renewable energy, I think the air we breathe and world we lived in

would look a lot better after a while due to all the pollution that would be getting eliminated.

This would be amazing for places like China or Japan were people currently need to wear masks

when they walk around because the air is that bad.

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After looking at cars, houses, and factories using renewable energy, we should look at

communities and cities that already are making the switch. Europe is currently being known as a

huge are to work this in. A big country in this is Sweden. Back in 2015, Sweden declared that it

wanted to start a race to become the first fully 100% renewable energy only country (The

Climate Reality Project). This is great news for the world. This is great because we will be able

to see that when a country decides to make it where everyone is working towards 100% eco-

friendly then we will be able to see the positive influence that it will have in their country. So far

54% of Sweden’s energy comes from renewable energy (Sweden). In Sweden, windmills are

producing a lot of their power. In Germany, they became the number 1 in solar panel use (The

Climate Reality Project). They are currently pushing to bring their electricity being ran only by

solar. While solar works great in Germany, places like Sweden, it is better to use windmills

instead. This shows how depending on geographic depends on what renewable energy will work

better.

Something to keep in mind, in which is something that bring a roadblock in The United

States being far behind is size. United States is a big country compared to most in Europe. A

single country in Europe is around the size of some of the states in The United States. This is

important to remember because trying to make many states follow the same push as a European

country won’t work as smooth since of the size of The United States. Most European counties

have a balance of a single most dominate terrain throughout. Being Sunny or windy. This makes

it easier to figure out which to integrate as a main source of energy in these countries. In the

United States it is a lot hard due to the difference in every state which would be better to use. In

some states it is still very different from the bottom of the state compared to the top of the state.
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After looking at how it would look if we switch to renewable energy with cars, houses,

factories, and places that already have them, how efficient would they be if we switch to them?

A common question that is asked. Since many places you see around the United States aren’t
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powered by renewable energy, most assumes that’s because while it’s good, it is not very

efficient at producing energy. I thought this too since when I would see videos growing up it

always seemed like something rich people had that didn’t use much energy anyways. The other

side is for solar houses that they wouldn’t work when it’s dark. While these may have been the

case back when I was growing up in school, it is no longer the case. Today we gotten to research

and invest in renewable energy enough that it is a lot more efficient and works just as good.

A prime example is in Sweden. In Sweden, they use a lot of energy and run the same

while also keeping a low C02 emission (Sweden). I think we can see by Sweden excellence in

moving toward all renewable energy that using only renewable energy won’t make you less

efficient then before. While talking about Sweden it is good to look back at IKEA. A Swedish

manufacturer that not only trying to be fully eco-friendly, but also bring their business model

with them everywhere they are. No matter where they are, they will find a way to be eco-

friendly. European countries aren’t switching to renewable energy because of the impact on the

world. While this is an advantage, Europe still wants to try to be at the top of the global goods

market. A big reason that Europe is starting to slowly switch to renewable resources is because

they’re able to still be as efficient. While it isn’t as exactly efficient as they were, they are still

investing and researching to make renewable energy more and more efficient as time goes on.

When looking at if they’re still efficient as using fossil fuels, the answer would be yes.

While slightly less, the difference does not really show on the market when companies are still

producing the same. Therefore, they’re still as efficient as using fossil fuels. With the advantage

of helping the environment.

When looking at eco-friendly communities, I think something must people are worried

about and want to know is what benefit are they to the world? When looking at the benefits there
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are three things to really look at and see. The first one is the air we breathe. The problem with the

energy we currently use burning fossil fuels, they pollute the air we breathe. Switching to

renewable energy would eliminate some and most of the types of air pollution that we have that

are from burning of fossil fuels (EPA).

Another benefit that switching to renewable energy would bring is it would bring an open

market. In the United States, being a Capitalist country, a great thing is having options on what

we can use. Bringing more renewable energy would bring renewable energy on the market of

energy suppliers. This kind of competition is good for a couple reasons. One it is good to bring

more notice to renewable energy. Making this more known means more research and cheaper

prices. Another benefit would be a less dependency on imported fuels. The problem with modern

fossil fuels that we use is that they’re not domestic. While switching to renewable energy, they

can be made here and used here.

Finally, a benefit would be more jobs. Like I was just talking about, if there are more

renewable energy sources to be used, there will be needing more jobs for people to make them.

Bringing more jobs for something that will help the environment is always a plus. The job field

would be expanded and I believe we will see unemployment go down for all the jobs needing in

departments of researching newer and better renewable energy, building and putting together all

the renewable energy sources, installation of renewable energy, and also to keep up on them to

make sure they’re still running great and cleaning and all.

Looking at all the good things about eco-friendly communities, it is also good to be aware

and look at the problems and the downfall of eco-friendly communities. While there are way

more benefits to renewable energy then there are drawbacks, there are still a few that are good to

look at and notice. A really big one is the first price of renewable energy (Thoubboron). They’re
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not cheap and they’re very expensive. But while this is a big downfall, there are some pluses

from this too. One is more research and more knowledge of them we will be able to make them

better and cheaper then what they currently are.

Another downfall is constant supply of energy. With fossil fuels or other fuels that we use

throughout, we can for the most part have a constant energy level. With renewable energy that is

not always the case. This is because if you’re using windmills to get your energy, then we all

know that not all days are as windy as others. If using solar energy, not everyday is as sunny as

others. When its night outside you get some energy but not that much from the sun still. When it

floods you can have a surplus of water for hydro energy sources, but that can also go and dry up

in a drought. Renewable energy is heavily depended on the weather and living in Ohio we all

know it can be snowing again the next day (Thoubboron).

Another disadvantage is storage. While there is more and more research and money going

into renewable energy, one problem is being able to store extra energy (Thoubboron). Reasons

this is needed is for things like if there is no wind and you don’t have the same amount of energy

coming in. It is good to have a backup energy. Another is if something happens and your power

goes out. If you have more storage and have some built up, then you can still get power. While

there are some currently on the market, they’re very expensive and still not as we would like.

They’re big and don’t hold a huge amount of energy as we would like.

Finally, a drawback is where you would be able to build the renewable energy

(Thoubboron). Just the make it relevant, we all live in different areas in Ohio. While in Ohio,

everyone of us has different ways we can use renewable energy. In Dayton we may have better
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use of solar panels then places near Indiana where it is flatter and windier, and windmills are a

better option. This is an advantage and a disadvantage. It’s an advantage because there are many

options to choose that will help the world. This is a disadvantage because if you live where it is

windy and need a windmill, they can look ugly and they’re huge. While needed to power your

home, I don’t think anyone wants to look outside and see a big windmill near where they live in

their community.

We are living in a world where renewable energy is looking great! There are many

researches that are going and looking how to make them look nice and efficient and cheap. There

is more we can currently do then just buy into renewable energy. While this is a great way, and

the most impactful, there is many things we can do like recycling and reducing what we use.

This is still important because we are buying many single uses bottles and goods that when we

are done are just thrown away and slowly piled up and can’t be reused to be recycled again due

to how skinny small, they are. Going from drinking many water bottles to just carrying a

refillable bottle and drinking that everyday makes a huge difference! While this is cheaper and

renewable energy is expensive at first, they will be cheaper during the long term and will save

you money but also pollute the air less too.

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Works Cited

Energy, United States Department of Energy & Renewable. Electric Vehicle Benefits. n.d.

Document. 22 March 2019. <https://www.energy.gov/eere/electricvehicles/electric-

vehicle-benefits>.

EPA. Local Renewable Energy and Carbon Pollution from Transportation. 17 July 2017.

<https://www.epa.gov/transportation-air-pollution-and-climate-change/carbon-pollution-

transportation>.

IKEA. Climate and Energy. n.d. <https://www.ikea.com/ie/en/this-is-ikea/people-planet/energy-

resources/climate-energy/>.

Leonardo, Greener + Cleaner: A Leonardo Academy. Air Pollution. n.d.

<http://www.cleanerandgreener.org/resources/air-pollution.html>.

Sweden. Energy Use In Sweden. 28 Feb 2019. <https://sweden.se/society/energy-use-in-

sweden/>.

The Climate Reality Project. Follow the Leader: How 11 Countries Are Shifting To Renewable

Energy. 03 Feb 2016. <https://www.climaterealityproject.org/blog/follow-leader-how-11-

countries-are-shifting-renewable-energy>.

Thoubboron, Kelly. Advantages and Disadvantages of Renewable Energy. 25 Oct 2018.

<https://news.energysage.com/advantages-and-disadvantages-of-renewable-energy/>.