By: Stephanie Rogers
http://earthfirst.com/11-bizarre-sources-of-clean-energy-from-dead-turkeys-to-urine/
Picture: These are examples of alternative energy. They are all crazy ideas. They are way different than coal, oil, and natural gas.There are many well known sources to provide us with energy such as wind turbines, solar energy, thermal, and more. You might be thinking they are the only sources of energy. However, not many know that there are other very weird alternative energy sources. Some of the alternatives are using watermelon juice, turkey guts, urine and human waste, garbage, onions, viruses, alcohol, and chocolate. A lot of people never would of thought of using these objects. If you thought some of the regularly used energy source were weird already, you should be in for a surprise.
You would normally think of watermelon as just a source of food. Now it is possible to use it as energy. It can now be a source for biofuel. Scientist have said that imperfect watermelons can be used to be fermented into ethanol. Don't worry about wasting the watermelons because since they are imperfect we would have just ignored them or not have used them anyway. Next, we can use turkey guts as energy. They are used to make oil. Just think after Thanksgiving you can use your turkey to make oil. A company called Changing World Technologies use turkey guts, feet, intestines, and rotting heads to make oil. However, this type of alternative energy needs to be refined before it becomes well known. It may be gross but yes we can use human and animal waste as a source of energy. It is used for buses to run on in Norway. The name is called biomethane. Also cow waste could one day power homes. Then, there is urine powered batteries. This would be a easy way to provide energy. Garbage can be used to provide electricity as well but it is a controversial topic because it isn't necessarily clean and it can pollute the air. Onion can also be a source for energy because the juice can be made into fuel. A farmer has tried this and save $700,000 off their electric bill because the farmer used the onion juice in his refrigerator and lighting. Another interesting source is viruses in a computer. You can use it to charge lithium-iron batteries. As weird and disgusting as it sounds you can use dead bodies to keep you warm. In a Swedish town they use dead bodies to produce heat. Then, we have alcohol. We can use it to be created into methane which can be used to fuel biogas-powered vehicles. Finally we have chocolate that can be an alternative. It is not necessarily chocolate that is used but the cocoa bean shells. It is mixed with coal to be made into fuel. All of these sources are very different then the source taught in school and are unheard of.
Opinion/Reflection: I am extremely shocked from reading about all of these alternative energy sources. This information could be really helpful in the future if something were to happen to our other sources. I just want to know how scientist find this stuff out. I never would of guessed that these objects would be used for energy. I think it is kind of gross being heated using dead bodies and using human waste as energy sources. I wonder if there are problems with any of these or if it is just as good as the energy source we use regularly. I like how most of the alternative energy sources are wastes so we would not be losing anything if we used them.
Questions:
1) Out of these alternative energy sources, which one would you want to use? Why?
2) Do you think any of these could actually be a legitimate energy source in the future? Why or why not?
3) Which one of these alternative energy source do you think could cause problems? Why?
