Subject taught
- Biology
- Chemistry
- Technology

Link
https://ed.ted.com/lessons/can-100-renewable-energy-power-the-world-federico-rosei-and-renzo-rosei#watch

Type of Product
- Videos

Language Skills Developed
- Interaction
- Listening
- Reading
- Speaking

Transferable/Scientific Skills Developed
• To understand that renewable energies are cheaper and more sustainable than the fossil fuels which will eventually run out. • To explain why renewable energies still provide only 13% of the total amount of the energy power used in the world. • To make a balance considering advantages and limits of the renewable energies. • To understand the importance of the technological challenge to overcome the limits of the renewable energies for a more ecologic world.

Description
General aims
o To make student aware that energy is available and could be also transformed in a renewable way, but still it is not possible to use that due to economic and technical problems
o To focus on the technical problems but at the same time to understand that their solutions depend on political and economical decisions of every Country in the world.
o To improve the comprehension of the students that the limits of the most used renewable energies are efficiency, transportation and storage.
o To show the student the recent improvement of technologic solutions in the field of the renewable such as use of superconductors and lithium ion batteries.
o To explain that the huge advantages coming from the use of renewable are sufficient to overcome all the technological, political, economical problems involved in their application.
Linguistic aims
o To expand their vocabulary in the field related to natural science, physic and ecological problems.
o To practice the impersonal language to speculate about scientific topics.
o To improve their listening skills.
o To increase their expertise to get useful information from a video.
Subject specific aims
o Earth science: to explain the general climate problems related to the use of solar energy, and to know the features of earth crust related to geothermal flow to use the heat of the Earth.
o Chemistry: to teach the most important chemical features of the element involved in today renewable technologies and some new compounds studied to overcome limits such as energy storage and efficiency.

Target group age: 15-16
Level of competence in English. (CEFR) B1
Time required to use the resource with the students.
4 hours
How to use it
o Watching the videos as the last step of the “teaching trip” trough the renewable energies.
o To use the video to explain the relation between limits and use of renewable technologies.
o To explain trough the video that the transition towards all renewable energies is a complex problem involving not only technology but even politics and economics.
o To give the students some useful elements to understand better and discuss together in a further stage.
o Possible difficulties for the students.
o To find a correlation between a lot of different aspects of a complex problem.
o To understand the link between limits and use of renewable energies.
o To understand some scientific aspect of the problem such as energy transmission, resistance, energy storage without solid physical basis.
o To understand that overcoming all the problems related to renewable is a big challenge but it would give the humanity the possibility to have a sustainable future

Comments
Strength Increasing civic consciousness of the students, who understand that the real well-being of people relies upon how energy resources are exploited and how much energy is consumed. Raising the awareness in young people that there is an urgent need to change lifestyles, for two main reasons: to preserve the current generation from negative effects linked to obsessive energy consumption, and to ensure that renewable energies are sufficient for a large part of the population’s needs • Weakness Students do not yet know some fundamental concepts of physics which are useful to understand the limits and disadvantages of renewable energies, such as efficiency of a thermal machine, energy dissipation by joule effect, battery charging mechanism. Pedagogical value After watching the video, the guided discussion between peer is an important phase of the learning process. In this way students learn to approach a problem using their critical sense and logic and to identify the pros and cons of a solution

Related Video Lessons

Renewable Energies: Part 1

Renewable Energies: Part 2